Sr. Operations Manager
- Compensation
- $146.8K–$201.9K
- Location
- Ithaca - New York - USA
- Work setup
- Not specified
- Seniority
- Senior
- Employment
- Contract
- Experience
- 3+ years
- Category
- Operations
- Posted
Skills
Must have
- MBA or Master's Degree in a related discipline.
- Minimum of 10 years of progressive manufacturing leadership experience.
- Minimum of 3-5 years leading supervisors, managers, and salaried leaders in a union manufacturing environment.
- Demonstrated success managing large-scale manufacturing operations with responsibility for safety, quality, delivery, cost, and people.
- Experience with labor relations, workforce planning, collective bargaining agreement administration, and employee engagement.
Nice to have
- Experience within the automotive or highly regulated manufacturing industry.
- Lean Manufacturing, Six Sigma, or Continuous Improvement certification.
- Multi-site or campus leadership experience.
Full description
Position Summary
The Senior Operations Manager is responsible for leading all manufacturing operations within a large, unionized production facility, ensuring the safe, efficient, and cost-effective delivery of products that meet customer requirements for quality, delivery, and performance. This role provides strategic and operational leadership across production, manufacturing engineering, continuous improvement, quality, maintenance, and production support functions.
The Senior Operations Manager partners closely with labor leadership, plant staff, and cross-functional teams to drive operational excellence, workforce engagement, productivity improvements, and business results. This position serves as a key member of the plant leadership team and is accountable for executing site strategies while fostering a culture of safety, accountability, continuous improvement, and positive labor relations.
Key Responsibilities
Operations Leadership
- Direct and oversee all manufacturing operations within a large-scale unionized manufacturing facility.
- Develop and execute operational strategies aligned with plant, business unit, and corporate objectives.
- Ensure achievement of production targets related to safety, quality, delivery, cost, productivity, and customer satisfaction.
- Drive operational excellence through effective resource planning, labor utilization, capacity management, and operational execution.
- Lead plant readiness efforts for new product launches, demand fluctuations, facility consolidations, and other strategic initiatives.
- Monitor, analyze, and improve key performance indicators (KPIs) including productivity, efficiency, scrap, downtime, throughput, and overall operational performance.
Labor Relations & Workforce Leadership
- Foster positive and productive labor-management relationships in partnership with Human Resources and union leadership.
- Ensure compliance with collective bargaining agreements, company policies, work rules, and applicable employment regulations.
- Support grievance administration, contract interpretation, investigations, and labor relations initiatives.
- Lead, coach, and develop supervisors, managers, and operational leaders within a unionized manufacturing environment.
- Promote employee engagement, accountability, teamwork, and a culture of mutual respect and inclusion.
Continuous Improvement
- Champion Lean Manufacturing, Six Sigma, BorgWarner Production System, and continuous improvement methodologies.
- Identify and implement cost reduction, productivity enhancement, and process optimization opportunities.
- Lead cross-functional teams in root cause analysis, problem solving, and corrective action activities.