Production Management Graduate Programme

Production Management Graduate Programme – kick-start your leadership career with Arla Foods
Looking for an international career in leadership at our state-of-the-art production sites, producing famous dairy brands like Lurpak, Arla and Castello? And are you ready to participate in business-critical projects from day one?
This is your chance to put your leadership potential and theoretical production knowledge to the test as part of our 2-year intensive Production Management Graduate Programme (PGMP). As current PMGP graduate Jonatan Stenbeck says:
“You will get the chance to become a manager of a team in production just one year into the programme. That gives you a unique chance to fast-track a leadership career within production in an FMCG company. Throughout the first year, I got prepared for stepping into a management role by having one rotation in my home country and one rotation abroad as a project manager with responsibilities adapted to my capabilities. Now, I am a manager for a team of 25 people at the production site in Linköping.”
- Jonatan Stenbeck, Production Management Graduate and Team Leader on his 3rd rotation at Linköping Dairy in Sweden
It’s time to define the future of dairy
At Arla Foods, we strive to push each other forward to meet the growing global demand for dairy and to make the industry sustainable with respect to both people and the environment. To do so, we need talented graduates who want to take part in realising our ambitious Future26 strategy, directly at our production sites.
A 2-year leadership programme at Arla’s dairy sites
You can look forward to a professional, tailor-made programme that will introduce you to a wide range of the challenges that we face in a high-volume, fast-paced production environment. An environment where our production leaders need to make quick decisions in response to often unexpected and complex situations.
“When I first started, I remember how impressed I was with the other graduates. It is a cool feeling being in a room full of highly competent and motivated people your age, especially when you know that despite our diverse nationalities and educational backgrounds, everyone has been high achievers in their fields.”
- David Bergman, First year Production Management Graduate, about the onboarding to the programme.
The programme will take you through 3 different rotations at 2 of our European dairy sites – either in Denmark, Sweden, United Kingdom, Germany, Finland or the Netherlands. We will assign you to the local sites where we see the best fit for your development opportunities.
Accelerate your growth with Arla
No matter your location, you will get to work on exciting projects – for instance related to sustainable production, digitalisation, lean optimisations and team management. You will join leadership training camps and receive coaching and mentoring from senior leaders to ensure your professional growth. See a visual explanation of the programme structure here.
Are you our next Production Management Graduate?
By September 2023, you will have graduated with either a bachelor’s or master’s degree, preferably within dairy, food science, engineering or a production-related subject.
We are looking for people who enjoy challenging the status quo, hunting the root cause and providing new solutions with passion, energy and empathy in a fast-paced environment. In addition, you:
Have the drive to deliver results and demonstrate the Arla Leadership Behaviours
Have an open and curious mindset, enabling you to gain an understanding of Arla Foods as a whole
Have complemented your studies with relevant work experience or perhaps even have 1-2 years of work experience after graduation
Have complimented your studies with an international experience. If the Covid-19 pandemic prevented you from this, please explain your initial plans, how they changed, and what relevant experience you gained instead
Have a collaborative mindset with strong influencing skills
Demonstrate resilience and self-awareness
Have a desire to take part in driving change as part of our ambitious transformation journey
Are internationally mobile and ready to take up an international career in production management within Arla Foods
Are fluent in English – furthermore, it is an advantage if you speak Danish, German, Swedish, Dutch or Finnish


Ready to kick-start your career?
All you have to do is to send us your CV, university transcripts and a cover letter, telling us why you have a future within production management at Arla Foods.
For additional information, please read more about the PMGP on our website. Here, you can learn more about the rotations, the leadership training camps, the recruitment process and much more.
You can also meet our current graduates and read about their experiences right here on our blog.
We have a purpose for Good
At Arla, we strive to unlock the highest potential in each other while working together to create a sustainable future of dairy. We call it Stronger People Stronger Planet and it is deeply anchored in our organisation and founded on our commitment to respecting human rights, increasing access to healthy dairy nutrition, inspiring good food habits, and improving the environment for future generations. In order to succeed we need to hire people with a sustainable mindset. Could this be you?
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Ref.: 82423
BEWARE! RECRUITMENT FRAUD
It has come to our attention that there are a number of fraudulent emails and fake recruitment campaigns on the internet from people purporting to work for Arla Foods. Learn more via this link.