Plant Director

Socket.dev; Lansing (MI); On-site; USD 120,000 - 180,000; Full time

Job summary

Socket.dev is seeking a Plant Director to lead operations across multi-site facilities, ensuring safety, quality, and profitability. The role drives continuous improvement and Lean initiatives while maintaining regulatory compliance and customer satisfaction.

The candidate will oversee budgeting, resource allocation, and cross-functional collaboration with sales, engineering, and regulatory teams to deliver excellence in product delivery and service.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in business, engineering or related field; MBA preferred.
• 8+ years manufacturing operations leadership experience.
• Proven lean manufacturing implementation and continuous improvement track record.
• Strong people development and change leadership.
• Strong financial acumen and cost management.
• Excellent communication across all levels of the organization.

Responsibilities

• Lead plant operations across multiple campuses, overseeing safety, quality, production, and customer service.
• Drive improvements in Safety, Quality, Delivery, and Cost metrics.
• Oversee budgeting, forecasting, revenue planning, cost control, and profitability.
• Ensure compliance with ISO, FDA, EPA, OSHA and other regulatory requirements.
• Lead New Product Introduction (NPI) execution to ensure on-time, on-quality results.

Skills

Lean culture

Financial acumen

Leadership

People development

Change management

Effective communication

Strategic thinking

Education

Bachelor’s degree in business/engineering

MBA

Job description

Position Summary

ThePlant Directorhas the responsibility for leading all aspects of operations a multi-campus or complex facility, including safety, production, quality, engineering, supply chain and customer service. The plant director has full P&L accountability and drives continuous improvement initiatives to ensure operational excellence, customer satisfaction and profitability. This role ensures achievement of key business objectives by fostering a safe, high-quality, and efficient work environment while meeting regularly compliance and customer satisfaction.

Principle Responsibilities

• Foster a culture where safety, quality, schedule, and cost are prioritized with a continuous improvement mindset.
• Drive rapid, significant, and sustainable improvements in Safety, Quality, Delivery, and Cost metrics.
• Oversee daily operations of the plant, ensuring optimal safety, quality, delivery, cost, and inventory performance.
• Develop and execute strategic plans aligned with company goals, including compliance with ISO, FDA, EPA, OSHA, and other regulatory requirements.
• Lead and manage New Product Introduction (NPI) execution, ensuring on-time, on-quality, and on-cost results.
• Ensure effective allocation of resources to meet customer-driven priorities and optimize operational efficiency.
• Oversee financial performance, including budgeting, forecasting, revenue planning, cost control, and profitability improvement.

• Identify opportunities to reduce costs in direct and indirect labor, manufacturing overhead, and inventory levels while enhancing operational efficiency.
• Manage capital expenditure planning to align with company technology needs, capacity, and cash flow requirements.

• Establish and review key operational metrics and performance indicators to ensure alignment with business objectives.
• Drive a Lean Operating System culture (5S, SMED, TPM, etc.) and lead the roadmap for achieving breakthrough performance.
• Conduct regular KPI reviews with the plant team to ensure goal attainment and prioritize implementation strategies.
• Continually benchmark and implement best practices to enhance efficiency and performance.

• Build, coach, and mentor a high-performance team, fostering morale and professional growth across multiple functions.
• Develop leadership and management capabilities within the team to sustain long‑term success.
• Establish and maintain strong relationships with internal and external stakeholders, including customers, suppliers, regulators, and corporate teams.
• Collaborate with sales, marketing, engineering, and other functional teams to deliver exceptional products and customer satisfaction.

Qualification Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in business, engineering, or related field. MBA preferred.
• 8+ years manufacturing operations leadership experience
• Demonstrated track record of significant performance improvement through the successful development of a lean culture, and implementation of the tools.
• Demonstrates implementation and/or ongoing development of a lean operating culture forms the basis for development of a sustainable competitive advantage.
• Strong developer of people and teams, believing it a critical component in driving organizational change and effectiveness.

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities:

• Highly customer responsive and entrepreneurial
• Resourceful, combining strong manufacturing and technical abilities with good overall management acumen
• Strong financial acumen
• Effectively deploys resources to key priorities
• Has, and sets, high expectations for him/herself and the organization; driven by metrics and countermeasures
• Ability and passion to lean operating system culture
• Selects great people and makes changes quickly when required
• Ability to create followership and lead an organization through significant change and improvement
• Tough‑minded but a welcome team member
• Strong communication skills, both verbal and written, and the ability to effectively communicate throughout all levels of the organization
• Possesses a high sense of urgency
• Low‑Ego/High‑Confidence
• Thinks expansively/innovatively and targets breakthrough performance, not simply incremental gain
• Is highly autonomous and self‑directed
• High degree of credibility to be convincing and persuasive
• Medical device industry experience, a plus

Other Requirements

Work Environment

The work environment characteristics described here are representative of those an employee encounters while performing the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

Physical Requirements

While performing the duties of this job, the employee could be required to stand. The employee could frequently be required to walk; use hand to finger, handle, or feel; reach with hands and arms and talk or hear. The employee could be required to sit; climb or balance and stoop, kneel, crouch, or crawl. The employee could occasionally lift and or move up to 50 pounds.Specific vision abilities required by the job could include close vision, distance vision, peripheral vision, and ability to adjust focus.

Travel Requirements

Up to 10%

Equal opportunity employer as to all protected groups, including protected veterans and individuals with disabilities

Americans with DisabilitiesAmericans with Disabilities Act (ADA):

Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

The statements herein are intended to describe the general nature and level of work being performed by employees and are not to be construed as an exhaustive list of responsibilities, duties, and skills required of personnel so classified. Furthermore, they do not establish a contract for employment and are subject to change at the discretion of the Company.