Group Leader

GKN•Garden Grove, CA

3d•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. This role is the second-line manufacturing leader connecting shop-floor Team Leaders with the Operations Leader responsible for broader operational performance, capability, and direction. The Group Leader owns manufacturing performance across assigned teams, shifts, product families, or production areas. The role leads daily management and operating discipline, reinforces quality and product integrity, coordinates cross-functional constraint removal, and develops Team Leaders. It also manages workforce and capacity needs, promotes continuous improvement, and ensures compliance with applicable employment, export-control, site-access, security, 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 itself as a global aerospace business with over 16,000 employees across 32 manufacturing sites in 12 countries. It emphasizes sustainability, diversity, inclusion, belonging, collaboration, and accessible recruitment.

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 safety and environmental practices across assigned teams, including routine floor presence, review of safety observations and leading indicators, escalation and correction of hazards, and accountability for applicable safety requirements.
Own manufacturing performance across assigned teams, shifts, product families, or production areas; review performance measures and establish owners and recovery actions when results deviate from plan.
Balance staffing, skills, equipment, and workflow as operating conditions change, and ensure Team Leaders have the instructions, specifications, tooling, materials, training, and support needed for consistent execution.
Lead daily management through Leader Standard Work, tiered communication, visible metrics, floor reviews, and disciplined action follow-up; establish consistent communication and escalation expectations.
Ensure abnormalities are contained, barriers have accountable owners, corrective actions are verified, and operating standards are documented, communicated, trained, audited, and sustained.
Reinforce manufacturing ownership of quality at the point of execution while respecting independent Quality authority; coordinate containment, root-cause analysis, and corrective actions with Quality and Engineering.
Coordinate cross-functional resolution of material, tooling, equipment, labor, quality, engineering, scheduling, and process constraints; prioritize competing needs and escalate significant issues with facts and recommendations.
Lead, coach, evaluate, and develop Team Leaders; set consistent leadership expectations, provide feedback, strengthen leadership capabilities, and establish development and succession actions.
Build structured problem solving into routine operations and use Lean methods, root-cause analysis, visual management, standard work, and analytical tools to reduce waste and improve flow.
Ensure improvements are incorporated into standard work and sustained, and develop Team Leaders to solve problems at their level.
Assess labor and skill requirements against production demand; coordinate staffing, cross-training, and skill deployment; identify capacity risks and support recovery, overtime, shift, staffing, and resource recommendations.
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; perform other duties consistent with the role and business needs.