The Senior Manager, Manufacturing Operations, leads a manufacturing area with responsibility for safety, quality, delivery, cost and culture on 3rd Shift.
This role drives daily execution and long-term improvement through strong leadership, disciplined operational routines and adherence to Lean principles. It oversees cross-functional teams, resolves operational issues, strengthens standardized work, advances quality and safety performance, and champions continuous improvement to deliver stable, efficient and high-performing production
Manufacturing Operations:
- Oversee end-to-end operations for a manufacturing area, ensuring strong performance in safety, quality, delivery, cost and culture.
- Develop the annual operational plan and align area metrics with overall plant objectives. Allocate resources to meet targets.
- Lead and support salaried and hourly production employees within a manufacturing area.
- Use production line boards to track performance, identify issues and drive problem resolution across shifts.
- Maintain a solid understanding of plant operations and follow escalation processes to resolve abnormalities and implement corrective actions.
- Drive adherence to Lean manufacturing practices, standardized work and the site escalation process.
- Track department metrics, manage budgets and deliver daily report-outs during production meetings.
- Establish a consistent operating rhythm including daily meetings with Area Business Leader and Team Leaders.
- Ensure standardized work is implemented, followed and regularly reviewed for stability and compliance.
- Coach Area Business Leaders, Process Improvement Engineers and Team Leaders on standardized work, job instruction methods and effective training practices.
- Maintain 5S standards across the entire manufacturing area.
Continuous Improvement:
- Champion the Appliance Production System and embed continuous improvement into daily operations.
- Lead teams to aggressively identify factory inefficiencies, conduct root cause analysis and implement sustainable solutions.
- Engage cross-functional escalation teams, including Lean resources, to address and resolve issues quickly and effectively.
- Identify and eliminate waste through both short-term countermeasures and long-term improvement initiatives.
- Serve as a second-level responder in the escalation process for operational issues.
- Lead regular reviews of open issues, assign ownership, track actions to closure and communicate updates to stakeholders.
- Drive kaizen events and ensure resulting countermeasures are implemented and sustained.
- Oversee work area rebalancing through tools such as Yamazumi charts.
Leadership:
- Provide hands-on leadership for an integrated, cross-functional manufacturing team.
- Set clear goals for team members and support performance through coaching, feedback, and development opportunities.
- Participate in performance reviews and partner with HR on talent development and succession planning.
- Manage employee relations issues including investigations and disciplinary actions in partnership with HR, ensuring proper documentation and consistency.
- Recruit and allocate resources to meet operational needs.
- Develop and mentor emerging leaders within the organization.
- Ensure fair and consistent application of policies, work rules and workplace processes.
Quality:
- Ensure all products within the manufacturing area meet specifications and are produced defect-free.
- Enforce compliance with the Manufacturing Control Plan and all quality standards.
- Monitor daily quality data and escalate or resolve defects promptly.
- Ensure standardized work incorporates quality requirements to meet design intent and build in quality at the source.
- Collaborate with engineering, quality and production teams to resolve line issues and prevent repeat defects.
- Review scrap data and lead efforts to reduce scrap and prevent recurrence.
- Partner with Plant Quality and engineering teams to improve key quality metrics such as First Pass Yield, Overall Yield and Service Call Rate.
Safety:
- Own overall safety performance and metrics for the manufacturing area.
- Foster a strong safety culture through behavior-based observations, audits, safety meetings and adherence to 5S practices.
- Enforce compliance with all safety rules and procedures while ensuring timely completion of accident investigations, safety contacts and safe start requirements.
- Review and approve all accident investigations, ensuring root cause identification and corrective actions are implemented.
- Maintain and drive closure of the safety action item list, including corrective actions from near misses, accidents and ergonomic assessments.
Qualifications:
- 7+ years of leadership experience in manufacturing, supplier management, and project implementation, with technical expertise across supply chain functions such as warehousing, distribution, materials, quality, procurement or fulfillment.
- BS/BA degree, ideally in engineering, supply chain management or business.
- Supply Chain Development Program graduate.
- Experience implementing Lean Manufacturing and driving continuous improvement using Lean, DMAIC, workout or similar methodologies.
- Black Belt or Master Black Belt certification.
- Strong verbal and written communication skills with the ability to influence at all levels.
- Demonstrated ability to teach, facilitate meetings, coach teams, give constructive feedback and listen effectively.
- Ability to identify, analyze and solve complex problems across cross-functional teams.
- Track record of achieving business goals, leading change and delivering measurable results through analytical methods and disciplined execution.
