Group Leader

GKN Aerospace • Garden Grove, CA

23h • Onsite

About The Position

Lead a manufacturing group consisting of multiple teams, production areas, or related operations to safely deliver conforming aerospace products on time and at required quality, cost, productivity, and customer-service levels. Translate organizational priorities into disciplined daily and weekly execution through Team Leaders. Establish consistent operating standards, strengthen accountability, remove cross-team barriers, develop frontline leadership capability, and ensure effective escalation and resolution of issues affecting safety, quality, delivery, cost, people, and capacity. Serve as the second-line manufacturing leader connecting Team Leaders responsible for shop-floor execution with the Operations Leader responsible for broader operational performance, capability, and direction.

The role leads manufacturing performance across assigned teams, shifts, product families, or production areas. It oversees safety, environmental and workplace controls; quality and product integrity; daily management and operating discipline; workforce and capacity; and continuous improvement. The Group Leader coordinates cross-functional resolution of constraints, develops Team Leaders, and ensures compliance with applicable employment, export-control, site-access, security, labor, quality, environmental, health, and safety requirements.

The position requires working on-site in an active manufacturing environment and supporting the schedule required by the assigned operation. GKN Aerospace describes its organization as having over 16,000 employees across 32 manufacturing sites in 12 countries.

Requirements

• High school diploma or GED equivalent.
• Seven years of progressive experience in a regulatory environment such as automotive, aerospace, or medical products.
• Three years of manufacturing supervisory or leadership experience, including responsibility for frontline leaders or multiple production teams.
• Demonstrated ability to manage safety, quality, delivery, cost, productivity, and workforce performance in a regulated manufacturing environment.
• Experience with daily management, performance metrics, structured problem solving, corrective-action follow-through, and cross-functional issue resolution.
• Strong communication, coaching, prioritization, problem-solving, and leadership skills.
• Ability to use business and manufacturing systems for performance tracking, analysis, documentation, and follow-up.
• Ability to work on-site in an active manufacturing environment and support the schedule required by the assigned operation.
• Must satisfy position-specific employment eligibility, export-control, site-access, and security requirements applicable to the work performed, including ITAR/EAR requirements.

Nice To Haves

• Bachelor's degree in Engineering, Operations, Manufacturing, Business, Management, or a related field.
• Experience leading in a unionized manufacturing environment.
• Experience managing multiple production teams, shifts, production areas, or value streams.
• Demonstrated experience coaching and developing frontline leaders and succession candidates.
• Experience with Lean manufacturing, daily management, Leader Standard Work, visual management, root-cause analysis, and continuous improvement.
• Experience supporting capacity improvement, production recovery, or manufacturing transformation.

Responsibilities

• Lead with a safety-first mindset and ensure Team Leaders set expectations for hazards, controls, personal protective equipment, and safe work practices.
• Maintain routine floor presence, review safety observations and leading indicators, and ensure prompt escalation and correction of injuries, near misses, environmental concerns, and unsafe conditions.
• Hold Team Leaders accountable for compliance with lockout/tagout, machine guarding, material handling, housekeeping, chemical, ergonomic, emergency, and other applicable requirements.
• Stop or redirect work when conditions could compromise employee safety, product integrity, equipment, or the environment, and coordinate resolution of risks spanning teams or functions.
• Own manufacturing performance across assigned teams, shifts, product families, or production areas and translate production requirements into near-term priorities.
• Review safety, quality, delivery, cost, productivity, labor, attendance, work-in-process, scrap, rework, downtime, and constraint performance; establish owners and recovery actions when results deviate from plan.
• Balance staffing, skills, equipment, and workflow between teams as operating conditions change while maintaining appropriate controls and escalation.
• Ensure Team Leaders have the work instructions, specifications, tooling, materials, training, and support required for consistent execution.
• Lead daily management through Leader Standard Work, tiered communication, visible metrics, routine floor reviews, and disciplined action follow-up.
• Establish consistent shift-to-shift and team-to-team communication, escalation, and decision-making expectations.
• Ensure abnormalities are contained, barriers are assigned to accountable owners, and corrective actions are verified for effectiveness.
• Ensure standards are documented, communicated, trained, audited, and sustained to prevent recurring problems from becoming accepted operating conditions.
• Reinforce that Manufacturing owns quality at the point of execution while respecting independent Quality authority.
• Ensure Team Leaders enforce approved work instructions, specifications, process controls, documentation, traceability, and configuration requirements.
• Coordinate rapid containment of product or process abnormalities and partner with Quality and Engineering on root-cause analysis and corrective action.
• Drive reductions in scrap, rework, repeat defects, escapes, and cost of poor quality without allowing production pressure to override required controls.
• Integrate operationally across issues that cannot be resolved within a single Team Leader's span of control.
• Coordinate with Quality, Manufacturing Engineering, Planning, Maintenance, Supply Chain, EH&S, Human Resources, Finance, and Continuous Improvement to resolve material, tooling, equipment, labor, quality, engineering, scheduling, and process constraints.
• Prioritize competing requirements based on safety, quality, customer need, production risk, and business impact, and maintain accountability until significant constraints are resolved.
• Escalate issues requiring director-level decisions with clear facts, operational impact, options, and a recommended course of action.
• Lead, coach, evaluate, and develop Team Leaders, setting clear leadership expectations and consistent operating standards across teams and shifts.
• Conduct routine one-on-one coaching and performance discussions, observe Team Leaders in operating conditions, and provide timely, candid feedback.
• Strengthen Team Leader capability in safety leadership, employee engagement, performance management, daily management, structured problem solving, and escalation.
• Identify leadership capability gaps, establish development and succession actions, and hold Team Leaders accountable for developing their employees.
• Build and sustain a culture aligned with Great Place to Grow values through visible leadership, respectful communication, recognition, consistency, and follow-through.
• Build structured problem solving into routine operations and lead resolution of recurring issues involving multiple teams or functions.
• Use practical Lean methods, root-cause analysis, visual management, standard work, and appropriate analytical tools to reduce waste and improve flow.
• Eliminate recurring queue, rework, waiting, handoff, and variation-related losses while protecting safety, quality, configuration control, and customer requirements.
• Incorporate improvements into standard work and ensure they are sustained; develop Team Leaders to solve problems at their level.
• Assess labor and skill requirements against production demand and coordinate staffing, cross-training, and skill deployment across assigned teams.
• Identify capacity risks, single-point dependencies, and resource gaps; support recovery, overtime, shift, staffing, and resource recommendations based on operating requirements.
• Partner with Human Resources on attendance, conduct, performance, labor-relations, employee-development, and organizational matters in accordance with company practices.
• Comply with applicable Equal Employment Opportunity, Affirmative Action, Export Control, labor, security, quality, environmental, health, and safety requirements, and perform other duties consistent with the role and business needs.

Benefits

• The company offers training opportunities, described as some of the best training in the industry.
• The company describes an inclusive culture focused on diversity, inclusion, belonging, collaboration, and accessibility in recruitment.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Manager
• Education Level: High school or GED