Daily Maintenance Leader

Ash. Ind. Nederland BV; Hopewell (VA); On-site; USD 85,000 - 125,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical benefits

401(k) plan

Job summary

Ashland Specialty Ingredients, GP in Hopewell, VA seeks a Daily Maintenance Leader to join Ashland LLC. The role reports to Maintenance Manager and drives maintenance leadership across the site, coordinating with operations to align safety, quality and cost priorities.

Responsibilities include leading Tier 1/2 meetings, coaching teams, ensuring adherence to procedures, and governing daily and weekly maintenance execution with cross-functional partners.

Qualifications

• 5–10 years in manufacturing supporting Maintenance/Operations.
• Experience leading maintenance teams in a union environment.
• HS Diploma or equivalent.
• Experience with maintenance planning, scheduling, and reliability programs.
• Demonstrated responsible and ethical behavior.

Responsibilities

• Lead maintenance teams and ensure safety and quality.
• Plan, schedule, and prioritize maintenance work.
• Foster a safe, compliant work environment.

Skills

Maintenance leadership

Union leadership

Maintenance planning

Maintenance scheduling

Reliability programs

Ethical behavior

Education

HS Diploma or equivalent

Tools

Maximo CMMS

Job description

Ashland Specialty Ingredients, GP

Daily Maintenance Leader

Are you the kind of person that is always thinking, sketching, seeking, and adjusting? Who needs to understand how things work and then figure out how they can work better? Are you a passionate, tenacious, solver who loves to work with others who share your drive? Are you positive, constructive, and ingenious?

Are you always solving?

Then we’d like to meet you and bet you’d like to meet us.

Ashland has an exciting opportunity for a Daily Maintenance Leader to join our Ashland LLC, Specialty ingredients business at our Hopewell, VA site. This is a very visible, significant role within the Company and the Maintenance function. This position will report to Maintenance Manager .

Responsibilities

• Leader - Culture change/developer Model and exemplify excellent leadership behaviors
• Lead/Facilitate/Develop Tier 1 meetings - report out at Tier 2 mtgs
• Provide coaching, create a high accountability culture
• Ensure adherence to stewardship and quality rules
• Provide operational feedback regarding policies/rules that don't appropriately fit operational capabilities
• Facilitate an effective union/company relationship
• Conduct 1:1 with employees
• Daily Maintenance Workflow Leader Own the site daily maintenance work flow process (Identify the need, approval, prioritization, scoping, planning, scheduling, execution, close out, and learning)
• Establish decision rights, standard work, meeting cadence, escalation pathways, and performance expectations across maintenance disciplines
• Align daily maintenance execution with plant safety, compliance, quality, production, and cost priorities (in that order)
• Ensure supervisors, planners, schedulers, engineers, crafts, contractors, and Operations work through one disciplined process
• Safety, Compliance & Field Leadership Owner Set and reinforce expectations for safe work planning, permitting, LOTO, line breaking, confined space, hot work, lifting, and other high-hazard activities
• Maintain visible field leadership through job-site engagement, verification of controls, and removal of barriers to safe execution
• Ensure maintenance work complies with site procedures, mechanical integrity requirements, environmental obligations, and quality standards
• Lead response to significant safety concerns, events, and changing field conditions
• Work Prioritization & Schedule Governance Leader Lead cross-functional prioritization of maintenance work through partnerships with Operations (engineering and operators), Reliability (engineering and SMEs), and Maintenance (engineering and technicians).
• Approve the daily and weekly maintenance schedule and protect schedule stability from avoidable break-ins
• Establish escalation and authorization requirements for emergency work, priority changes, and resource conflicts
• Ensure deferred work has documented risk, ownership, interim controls, and a planned path to completion
• Execution Performance & Resource Leader Direct maintenance supervisors and functional leads in safe, efficient execution of the schedule and work priorities
• Balance internal crafts, contractors, tools, equipment, and specialist support across plant priorities
• Review execution progress, emergent constraints, labor loading, backlog exposure, and recovery actions
• Remove cross-functional barriers and escalat decisions as required to maintain team collaboration and engagement
• Planning, Scheduling & Backlog Health Owner Set standards for job-plan quality, materials readiness, permits, procedures, drawings, isolation needs, contractor support, and acceptance criteria
• Govern backlog segmentation, aging, risk ranking, planning status, and readiness for scheduling
• Coach planning and scheduling functions on work-package quality, resource leveling, and schedule constructability
• Ensure the weekly schedule is based on ready work, realistic capacity, and operating access
• Reliability & Defect Elimination Strategy Implementor Integrate daily maintenance decisions with asset strategies, bad-actor priorities, preventive maintenance, predictive findings, and reliability improvement plans
• Sponsor root-cause analysis and defect-elimination actions for significant or repetitive failures
• Challenge recurring repairs, temporary fixes, and maintenance practices that do not address verified failure causes
• Partner with Reliability, Engineering, and Operations to convert failure learning into sustainable equipment and process improvements
• Maintenance Quality & Work Management Assurance Leader Establish expectations for precision maintenance, repair specifications, technical tolerances, inspection points, testing, documentation, and equipment turnover
• Review significant rework, post-maintenance failures, incomplete work orders, and quality escapes
• Ensure work orders capture failure information, labor, materials, findings, and follow-up requirements
• Hold leaders and service providers accountable for technical quality and complete closeout
• Performance, Cost & Contractor Governance Owner Maintain a decision-focused maintenance scorecard covering safety, schedule compliance, planned-work percentage, reactive work, backlog, PM/PdM completion, rework, overtime, contractor use, and cost
• Analyze performance gaps and assign corrective actions with owners and due dates
• Govern contractor strategy, service quality, productivity, safety performance, and commercial compliance
• Manage maintenance spending and forecasts while protecting safety, compliance, reliability, and production requirements
• Actively contribute to the organizational goals by taking initiative, executing on goals and focusing on performance and safety
• Improve the organization capacity and capabilities through building collaborative relationships, optimizing diverse talent and utilizing positive communications and influence with others

Qualifications

• 5-10 years in manufacturing supporting Maintenance/Operations
• Demonstrated experience leading maintenance teams in a union environment
• HS Diploma or equivalent
• Experience with maintenance planning, scheduling, and reliability programs in a chemical manufacturing environment
• Demonstrated responsible and ethical behavior at all times

Preferred Skills

• Maximo CMMS experience

Perks

• Comprehensive Benefit package, Medical, Dental and Vision starting on Day 1 for you AND your family
• 401(k) plan with company match

In more than 100 countries, the people of Ashland LLC. (NYSE: ASH) provide the specialty chemicals, technologies and insights to help customers create new and improved products for today and sustainable solutions for tomorrow. Our chemistry is at work every day in a wide variety of markets and applications, including architectural coatings, automotive, construction, energy, personal care and pharmaceutical. Visit www.ashland.com to see the innovations we offer.

At Ashland our vision is to be a leading, global specialty chemicals company whose inspired and engaged employees add value to all we touch. In fact our people, employees, customers and vendors define who we are. They are the driving force behind everything we do.

Not only do we value our customers but we value our employees, and we work to offer them a dynamic and challenging environment. We hold ourselves to high standards at Ashland, and we value integrity and honesty.

Ashland has a history of attracting the best people and keeping them. The reasons are simple: industry competitive salary and benefits, pay-for-performance incentive plans and a diverse work environment where employees feel challenged and valued. People come to Ashland and stay. As a growing Fortune 500 specialty chemicals company, we offer opportunities for development and advancement throughout our global organization. Our values define who we are and what we care about as a company. If you are looking for a relationship with a company instead of simply a job, this may be a great fit.

Ashland is proud to be an Equal Opportunity Employer Minorities/Women/Veterans/Disabled/Gender Identity/Sexual Orientation.

All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, national origin, or protected veteran status and will not be discriminated against on the basis of disability. NOTE: We do not accept resumes from external staffing agencies or independent recruiters for any of our openings unless we have a signed recruiting agreement in place to fill a specific position.