Plant Manager

Ashland Conveyer Products; Ashland (OH); On-site; USD 120,000 - 180,000; Full time

Job summary

Ashland Conveyer Products seeks a Plant Manager to lead day-to-day manufacturing operations at its Ohio facility, spanning Legacy Conveyor and Smart Conveyance. You will own safety, quality, delivery, productivity, and cost performance, while partnering with Engineering, Sales, Quality, Finance, and HR to drive growth.

You will develop operating plans, lead a lean transformation, manage budgets, and build a capable leadership team to ensure on-time production and continuous improvement.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree required or related discipline with strong leadership experience.
• 10+ years of progressive manufacturing experience with significant leadership responsibility.
• Experience leading manufacturing operations and production teams.
• Strong understanding of lean manufacturing, continuous improvement, and plant financial performance.

Responsibilities

• Provide overall leadership and accountability for manufacturing operations across Legacy Conveyor and Smart Conveyance.
• Coordinate plant activities to meet schedules and budgets.
• Lead and develop the operations team and direct reports.
• Establish plant priorities and ensure customer commitments are supported by labor, material, and capacity.
• Own plant-level safety, quality, delivery, productivity, and costs.

Skills

Leadership

Lean manufacturing

Production planning

People development

ERP/MRP experience

Problem solving

Communication

Education

Bachelor's degree in Engineering, Operations Management, Manufacturing, Business, or related discipline

Tools

ERP/MRP systems

BOMs

Routings

Job description

The Plant Manager is the senior operational leader for the Ashland facility and is responsible for overall day-to-day plant performance across Legacy Conveyor and Smart Conveyance. The role owns safety, quality, delivery, productivity, labor, capacity, inventory/material flow, manufacturing cost performance, continuous improvement, manufacturing processes, and organizational development. The Plant Manager develops the operating system, leadership structure, equipment, processes, and capacity required to support continued growth while partnering closely with Engineering, Sales, Customer Service, Quality, Supply Chain, Finance, and Human Resources.

Primary Responsibilities

• Provide overall leadership and accountability for manufacturing operations across Legacy Conveyor and Smart Conveyance.
• Coordinate plant activities through department leaders to ensure objectives are accomplished in a timely, cost-effective manner, while adhering to production schedules and budget targets.
• Lead and develop the operations team, specifically direct reports.
• Establish plant priorities and ensure customer commitments are supported by appropriate labor, material, equipment, and capacity.
• Own plant-level safety, quality, delivery, productivity, cost, inventory, and continuous-improvement performance.
• Establish, monitor, and drive improvements in key operational performance indicators, including workplace safety, on-time delivery, labor efficiency, productivity, quality, inventory accuracy, manufacturing costs, and schedule attainment.
• Develop operating plans, capacity plans, staffing strategies, budgets, forecasts, and capital priorities.
• Drive scalable manufacturing processes, plant layout, automation, tooling, fixtures, equipment utilization, and material flow.
• Drive continuous improvement through Lean Manufacturing processes, eliminating waste and enhancing operational efficiency.
• Partner with Engineering on manufacturability, new-product introduction, design-for-manufacturing feedback, production readiness, and technical problem solving.
• Provide leadership and accountability for Materials, Inventory, and Production Control, ensuring accurate inventory, effective production scheduling, timely material availability, and coordination between purchasing, manufacturing, and customer commitments.
• Build, develop, and hold accountable a strong plant leadership team, establishing clear responsibilities, performance expectations, effective communication, and succession planning while promoting ownership and independent decision-making throughout the organization.
• Provide plant-level leadership for major projects, customer programs, FAT readiness, facility expansion, equipment relocation, and significant product launches.
• Monitor manufacturing financial performance, including labor, overtime, operating expense, productivity, manufacturing cost, and drivers of gross margin.
• Maintain a strong, visible leadership presence on the manufacturing floor while establishing a disciplined daily management structure that drives accountability through supervisors and team leaders, ensuring production schedules, customer commitments, and operational objectives are consistently achieved.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Engineering, Operations Management, Manufacturing, Business, or related discipline preferred.
• 10+ years of progressive manufacturing experience with significant leadership responsibility.
• Demonstrated experience leading manufacturing operations and production teams.
• Strong understanding of lean manufacturing, continuous improvement, production planning, manufacturing processes, and plant financial performance.
• Experience with ERP/MRP systems, BOMs, routings, inventory, production costing, and manufacturing data.
• Experience with capital equipment, automation, facility layout, capacity planning, and new-product launches preferred.
• Strong technical aptitude, problem-solving capability, communication skills, and people-development ability.

PHYSICAL REQUIREMENTS:

• Must be able to work standing, walking, bending, reaching, and stooping (Frequently)