Plant Production Engineer

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Grow a Better Tomorrow with Nufarm. We know that growing is about more than just crops and cultivation. It’s about sunshine and rain, early mornings and hard work. It can be frustratingly unpredictable but also wonderfully uplifting. More than anything, it’s about people. Nufarm is the dependable partner behind thousands of agricultural success stories. Every day, growers around the world turn to our products and our people to help with the challenges of fighting disease, weeds and pests, and to increase crop yields.

Based in Chicago Heights, IL, Nufarm is looking for a Plant Production Engineer reporting to the Operations Manager. The position works closely with the Operations team including shift teams, supervisors, production manager and Operations Managers to drive process optimization and improvement for formulation and associated units in the production plant, as well as partnering with maintenance and quality control teams and other supply chain functions.

The position will develop to be the process owner and subject matter expert for assigned areas, including formulation vessels, and packaging lines. Responsibilities will include daily assessment of performance of the process units (yield, throughput, quality), investigation and corrective actions for quality and safety incidents and conformance to Nufarm safety and quality standards. In addition, the position will lead or support continuous improvement projects to drive safety, quality efficiency, cost, new product introduction and new equipment design and commissioning in the plant.

• Lead by example on safety programs and policies
• Close audit actions on assigned areas of responsibilities
• Initiate, manage and close MOC actions related to assigned areas of responsibilities
• Eliminate production variance related to material usage variance, yield, write-offs
• Measure and improve overall equipment effectiveness (OEE)
• Implement statistical process controls (SPC) in critical areas to improve the plant performance in areas of safety, quality, production, and costs
• Keep Billing of Material (BOM) updates, reduce scrap factors and improve routings in Oracle
• Work closely to the Production Coordinator, Production Manager and Supervisors and Production Scheduler to improve adherence to production plans for the next 12 months.
• Active involvement in the RCCP meetings to ensure the success of the production plans and to deliver on our promises to customers.
• Certified Apollo root cause process, lead investigation and ensure actions are closed in assigned area of responsibilities. Implement sustainable corrective solutions for management systems breakdowns associated with identified root causes
• Ensure procedures/checklists are maintained updated and properly used
• Troubleshoot the plant together with the Operations team to avoid safety, quality and production issues.
• Document best practices, learned lessons, corrective and preventive actions in the plant standard operations procedures (SOPs)
• Ensure Unusual Incident Reports (UIRs) are recorded, investigated and actions properly closed.
• Support Operations and Packaging managers on spending management and cost reduction initiatives
• Support new product introduction and ensure new campaigns are produced safely, on-time, meeting quality specifications at lower costs
• Take customers to site tours and work with quality to reduce quality complaints
• Ensure assigned area of responsibilities run free of product contamination and compliance to Nufarm Product Integrity Golden Rules. Croplife’s requirement subject matter expert.
• Support capex projects in the scope definition, construction, procedure writing/implementation, training of plant personnel and release to operation.
• Back up for the Process Control Engineer to troubleshoot code/logic issues and to ensure the operation is done free of forces and alarm nuisance
• Train or support the plant personnel to be trained in all areas related to the packaging operations, including safety, product contamination,…