Senior Plant Operations Lead - Food Manufacturing

General Mills, Inc; Rex City (MO); On-site; USD 95,000 - 143,000; Full time

Job summary

General Mills, Inc. in Joplin, Missouri, seeks an Operations Manager to own production operations at the Pet Treating facility. You will lead three supervisors and their hourly teams to deliver safe, high‑quality products on time and within budget.

You'll manage Lean initiatives, safety, quality, and cost performance, develop frontline leaders, set clear expectations, and use data to drive improvements across production planning, maintenance collaboration, and regulatory compliance.

Qualifications

• 5+ years of progressively responsible manufacturing experience, including food industry.
• 1+ year of experience directly managing salaried employees.
• Experience leading production or operations teams with safety, quality, service, productivity and cost focus.
• Experience leading Kaizen events or continuous improvement work.

Responsibilities

• Lead daily production through three supervisor direct reports and their hourly teams.
• Plan production to meet volume, efficiency, service, safety, quality and cost objectives.
• Review KPIs and drive focused improvement plans.
• Lead lean initiatives including Kaizen events and SMED/5S/standard work.
• Partner with Maintenance and Engineering on equipment reliability and capital opportunities.

Skills

Leadership

Lean

Kaizen

Problem solving

Communication

Team development

Education

Bachelor/Associates in business/operations

Tools

Redzone

MS Excel

Job description

General Mills, Inc. in Joplin, Missouri, seeks an Operations Manager to own production operations at the Pet Treating facility. You will lead three supervisors and their hourly teams to deliver safe, high‑quality products on time and within budget.

You'll manage Lean initiatives, safety, quality, and cost performance, develop frontline leaders, set clear expectations, and use data to drive improvements across production planning, maintenance collaboration, and regulatory compliance.