Vacancy Name
Plant Operations Manager

Vacancy No
VN868

Employment Type
Full-Time

Shift

Duration (if temporary)

Location Country
United States

Location State
New Jersey

Location City
South Plainfield

Description
The Plant Operations Manager oversees all plant production, inventory, logistics, and quality management systems. This hands-on role is responsible for planning and directing manufacturing activities to maximize profit, product quality, and safety. You will also lead the development, maintenance, and compliance of our ISO 9001:2015 Quality Management System (QMS).

Key Responsibilities
• Safety & Compliance: Maintain a safe workplace, enforce OSHA/EHS requirements, conduct safety reviews, investigate incidents, and ensure regulatory and environmental compliance.
• Production Management: Achieve daily/weekly/monthly production schedules while balancing labor, equipment, materials, and capacity.
• On-Time Delivery: Own manufacturing execution against customer commitments, backlog, schedule adherence, and recovery plans for late orders.
• Quality: Ensure products meet specifications and quality-system requirements; drive corrective actions, root-cause analysis, scrap reduction, and first-pass yield.
• People Leadership: Lead supervisors and hourly employees; establish expectations, coach performance, develop talent, manage attendance, staffing, training, and succession.
• Productivity & Cost Control: Improve labor efficiency, machine utilization, throughput, overtime, scrap, rework, and manufacturing cost.
• Continuous Improvement: Drive Lean manufacturing, 5S, standard work, value-stream improvements, visual management, and waste elimination.
• Capacity & Resource Planning: Ensure sufficient labor, equipment, tooling, floor space, and manufacturing capability to support demand.
• Maintenance & Reliability: Coordinate preventive maintenance and capital improvements to maximize equipment uptime and minimize unplanned downtime.
• Inventory & Material Flow: Work with purchasing and planning to maintain appropriate raw material, WIP, and finished-goods inventory while avoiding shortages and excess.
• Planning: Participate in demand and supply planning, identify capacity constraints, and develop production plans aligned with sales forecasts and backlog.
• KPI Management: Maintain a plant operating dashboard and take corrective action when performance falls below target.
• Financial Performance: Manage plant expenses, labor spending, overtime, manufacturing variances, capital expenditures, and cost-reduction initiatives.
• Engineering Support: Partner with engineering on standard products and engineered to orders. Review routings, work instructions, tooling, manufacturability, and process improvements.
• Customer Support: Assist with expedited orders, quality issues, customer visits, audits, FATs, and major project requirements.
• Facility Management: Maintain an organized, clean, professional facility and ensure infrastructure supports safe operations.
• Cross-Functional Leadership: Coordinate closely with Sales, Engineering, Purchasing and Finance to resolve issues quickly.
• Strategic Improvement: Develop annual plant objectives around safety, delivery, quality, productivity, cost, inventory, and workforce capability.
• Partner with Engineering to improve cost control, production methods, and safety.
• Coordinate large valve projects and manage vendor training.
• Participate in daily production reviews and weekly planning meetings.

Key Requirements
• Education: Bachelor's Degree in Operations Management, Manufacturing Engineering, or a closely related technical field.
• Experience: Minimum of 10 years of experience in manufacturing environments with increasing responsibility and proven leadership roles.
• Quality Expertise: Strong working knowledge of ISO 9001:2015 standards and QMS implementation.
• Software Skills: Proficient with Microsoft Office, material planning and quality management tools.
• Leadership: Exceptional ability to supervise teams, train staff, and manage large-scale projects.
• Problem Solving: Strong analytical skills to handle audits, inventory shortages, and process improvements.

Education Level
Bachelor's Degree or equivalent

Experience Level
More than 9 years

Benefits
• Health/Prescription Coverage
• FSA or HSA
• Dental
• Vision
• Life Insurance
• Company-match 401(k) Plan
• Vacation/Sick/Paid Holidays
*All benefits start on date of hire

Physical Requirements