Understanding, Identifying, and Mitigating Food Supply Chain Risk — A Conversation with Kim Daniels and Cheryl Alesso of RQA, Inc.

The bluEPrint by Executive Platforms

At North American Food Safety & Quality 2023 we sat down with Kim Daniels and Cheryl Alesso of RQA to talk about the power of proactivity in Food Supply Chains, some of the big trends food and beverage manufacturers are facing right now when they look at their operations, and what companies can do when they need specific expertise and extra hands in moments of crisis. This is a wide-ranging conversation that touches on everything from supplier relationships to crisis management to auditing and inspections to the importance of after-action remotes to learn lessons that can be applied moving forward. Give this one a listen!

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Kim Daniels is RQA’s Director, Crisis & Risk Management. She has more than 20 years of experience in the food and beverage alcohol industry including Quality, Food Safety, Recall, Crisis Management, Supply Chain Management, GFSI Auditing, Governance and Consumer / Customer Care. Since 2018, Kim has consulted in a variety of consumer products industries including preparing organizations for GFSI audits, conducting 3rd party due diligence audits, training on Recall, Crisis Management, Food Defense and Allergen Cross Contact Prevention, leading global Consumer Care gaps analysis and optimization and supporting organizational program maturity development, design, and strategic talent planning initiatives. Kim was the Director of Quality Excellence at Diageo responsible for Design Quality, Supplier Quality, Manufacturing Quality and Consumer / Customer Quality. Kim was responsible for developing and delivering Global Quality strategy and identifying best practices solutions to improve organizational effectiveness. She implemented Diageo’s first Consumer Care program for North America and Latin America, developed a Global Consumer Care strategy, completed a 12-month program focused on developing Woman in Leadership for Supply Chain Excellence and received two President Spirit of Supply awards for Brilliant Execution in Global QualityExcellence and Crisis Management. Kim holds an Associates in Science, and an undergraduate and MBA in Organizational Leadership. She is certified in the following disciplines: Certified CQI & IRCA FSSC Lead Auditor, Implementing SQF Systems, FDA FSMA PCQI for Human Food, Foreign Supplier Verification Program, Intentional Adulteration Vulnerability Assessment, HACCP, Lean Six Sigma Green Belt, Supply Chain Professional, and as an Agile Scrum Master.

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RQA, Inc.

Founded in 1989, RQA is the global leader in providing quality assurance and food safety consultancy, training and services to the food and beverage industry. RQA offers Retail Quality Audits, Counterfeit Investigations, Consumer Complaint and Product Retrieval, Crisis Planning and Management and Product Recall Services globally. RQA Food Forensics™ is the leading provider of foreign material identification services. FSMA compliance training includes PCQI for Human and Animal Foods, Foreign Supplier Verification Program, and Food Defense Programs. RQA’s consultancy team also assists with the development of these programs.

www.rqa-inc.com