Manager, Continuous Improvement

Grain & Protein Technologies•Assumption, IL

2d•$100,000 - $130,000•Onsite

About The Position

The Continuous Improvement Manager will lead the development, implementation, and sustainability of a Continuous Improvement culture at the Assumption, Illinois facility. This highly visible, hands-on role works directly with production employees and cross-functional teams to identify and eliminate waste, improve flow, solve problems at their root causes, and establish sustainable standard work. The role requires significant time on the production floor teaching and coaching teams, challenging existing processes, and helping convert improvement ideas into measurable results. The manager will help lead the Assumption factory transformation and re-layout, developing current- and future-state Value Stream Maps and manufacturing-flow concepts. They will evaluate movement of equipment, people, materials, warehouse goods, work in process, and finished goods, identify opportunities to condense operations, and reduce unnecessary transportation, staging, handling, and storage. The manager will also partner with Operations leadership to prioritize opportunities based on performance in safety, quality and scrap, schedule adherence, earned hours versus paid hours, machine and labor capacity, setup and changeover, material travel and handling, and floor-space utilization. The position is based onsite at the Assumption, IL facility. Grain & Protein Technologies describes its purpose as “Feeding the World Better,” its mission as making farmers and agribusiness managers more productive and profitable, and its approach as achieving balanced and sustainable success for employees, customers, and owners.

Requirements

Significant manufacturing experience, preferably in fabrication, welding, powder coating, assembly, material handling, or other discrete manufacturing environments.
Demonstrated experience leading Continuous Improvement or Operational Excellence initiatives.
Proven experience changing manufacturing processes directly on the shop floor.
Experience with factory layout, material flow, cellular manufacturing, or plant transformation projects.
Demonstrated ability to lead cross-functional improvement efforts from problem identification through sustained implementation.
Strong understanding of Lean manufacturing principles and structured problem solving.

Nice To Haves

Bachelor’s degree in Engineering, Manufacturing, Operations, Industrial Engineering, Supply Chain, or a related field, or equivalent practical manufacturing experience.
Lean Six Sigma Green Belt or Black Belt.
Experience facilitating Kaizen events and Value Stream Mapping.
Experience in high-mix fabrication environments.

Responsibilities

Establish Continuous Improvement as part of the facility’s daily operating culture.
Coach leaders and frontline teams in the practical application of Lean principles.
Encourage employees to identify problems and waste, determine root causes, and implement countermeasures.
Help leaders shift from reacting to problems to preventing recurrence through root-cause problem solving and standardization.
Lead factory transformation and re-layout efforts at the Assumption facility.
Develop current-state and future-state Value Stream Maps and manufacturing-flow concepts.
Evaluate the movement of equipment, people, materials, warehouse goods, work in process, and finished goods.
Identify opportunities to condense manufacturing operations and reduce unnecessary transportation, staging, handling, and storage; validate results.
Lead teams in identifying and reducing the Eight Wastes, including waiting, excess motion and transportation, overprocessing, inventory, defects, overproduction, and unused talent.
Lead and coach the use of Lean operating-system tools, including 5S, workplace organization, Value Stream Mapping, Standard Work, Visual Management, Daily Management and Tier accountability, Gemba, 5 Whys and Root Cause Analysis, Kaizen, SMED and setup reduction, flow and cellular manufacturing, pull systems and Kanban, bottleneck and constraint management, and countermeasure tracking.
Partner with Operations leadership to identify and prioritize improvement opportunities based on operational performance.
Lead cross-functional improvements from problem identification through sustained implementation.