Production Manager

Location: On-site (cleanroom manufacturing environment)

Reports to: Director of Operations

Salary Range: $70,000 – $90,000, commensurate with experience

Schedule: Full-time, single shift (day)

Sheaumann Laser designs and manufactures high-performance semiconductor lasers, with in-house operations spanning epitaxial growth, wafer fabrication, and optoelectronic packaging (die attach, wire bond, alignment, test, and burn-in). We are seeking a hands-on, floor-present Production Manager to lead our production team of 12 operators and 2 lead operators.

This is a working manager role, not an office role. You will spend the majority of your day on the production floor — running the daily plan, keeping work flowing to every operator, removing obstacles, and building the systems (dispatch, training, qualification) that make consistent execution possible. You will own on-time delivery, throughput, and operator performance.

This is an excellent step-up opportunity for a strong production supervisor, senior lead, or engineering-minded technician from a semiconductor, photonics, or precision electronics environment who is ready to run a floor.

• Build and maintain a daily/weekly dispatch list so every operator always knows their current and next assignments — no one waits to be told what to do
• Manage WIP across all production stages (epi, fab, dicing, packaging, test) to maximize flow through constraint operations
• Coordinate with purchasing, engineering, and quality to ensure lots are kitted, dispositioned, and ready to run before they reach the floor
• Provide realistic capacity-based commit dates to support delivery scheduling; own on-time shipment performance against a significant backlog
• Spend the majority of each day on the production floor; run a short daily standup with leads and operators
• Identify and eliminate operator idle time; track idle time by root cause (material, disposition, qualification, assignment) and drive corrective action
• Direct and develop the two lead operators; establish clear escalation paths for equipment, quality, and material issues

• Build and maintain a skills/qualification matrix for all operators and operations; drive cross-training to eliminate single-person bottlenecks
• Establish formal training, certification, and requalification standards per operation, with documented work instructions
• Set clear performance expectations; coach, document, and manage underperformance, partnering with the Director of Operations and HR on corrective action
• Own operator hiring: define selection criteria (dexterity, attention to detail, documentation discipline), participate in interviews, and implement practical skills assessments

• Drive consistent execution to work instructions across all operators; reduce operator-induced quality escapes
• Lead root-cause investigation of floor-level quality issues with quality and engineering
• Identify and implement improvements to flow, layout, tooling, and process discipline

• 5+ years in manufacturing operations, including 2+ years supervising or leading production personnel
• Direct hands-on experience in semiconductor, photonics, optoelectronics, MEMS, or precision electronics assembly manufacturing (cleanroom environment strongly preferred)
• Demonstrated ability to understand and manage a multi-stage technical process flow — you can walk a line, understand what each station does, and reason about where and why WIP queues
• Proven floor-based management style; comfortable spending 60–80% of the day on the production floor
• Experience building or running production scheduling/dispatch systems (manual boards, spreadsheets, or MES/ERP)
• Experience training, qualifying, and performance-managing operators
• Strong communication skills; able to work effectively with engineering, quality, purchasing, and sales

• Experience in laser diode, photonic device, or optoelectronic packaging operations (die attach, wire bonding, fiber/optical alignment, burn-in/test)
• Familiarity with lean manufacturing tools: visual management, kanban/pull systems,…