Associate Project Manager

At the heart of what we are, we are a small company that specializes in manufacturing personal care products. While we are much bigger now than what we were 20 years ago or even 5 years ago, our company was built on a belief that being small meant that we had to be faster than our competition, smarter, braver and of course, nicer.

We knew that in order to make it, we had to produce products that our customers needed, in time, priced right, and with the highest quality. We knew innovation meant pushing the envelope on design and thinking. Most importantly, we knew that developing relationships meant building a reputation for coming through on promises and standing behind our product. That is who we are today and how we operate every day.

The Associate Project Manager is for independently managing low-to-moderate complexity commercialization and launch projects from initiation through execution. This role serves as the primary project owner for assigned projects and is responsible for driving timelines, coordinating cross-functional activities, managing risks, and ensuring successful launch execution while achieving Product Availability Date (PAD), On-Time In-Full (OTIF), and Right First Time (RTFT) objectives.

The Associate Project Manager partners closely with Operations, Engineering, Quality, Supply Chain, Regulatory, Research & Innovation, and Sales to ensure project deliverables are completed on time and customer expectations are met. This position leads customer and internal project communications, proactively identifies risks, develops mitigation plans, and drives accountability across functional teams to support successful commercialization, development, pilot, line trial, and production launch activities.

The role requires strong organizational, communication, and project management skills, along with the ability to manage multiple priorities in a fast-paced manufacturing environment while supporting continuous improvement and launch excellence initiatives.

• Own and manage low-to-moderate complexity project timelines, ensuring tasks, dependencies, and milestones are created, maintained, and consistently updated.
• Lead customer and internal project meetings, ensuring action items, risks, and deliverables are clearly communicated and tracked. Coordinate commercialization activities including development, pilot runs, line trials, first production, and launch readiness activities.
• Execute established launch processes to ensure RFT and OTIF metrics are achieved.
• Drive weekly project reviews, identifying at-risk items and enforcing escalation paths when delays threaten PAD or customer commitments.
• Serve as the primary owner of the launch timelines, and ensuring timelines reflect accurate information from Operations, Supply Chain, Engineering, and Quality.
• Track and communicate risks and blockers, develop mitigation plans, and ensure accountability across teams.
• Coordinate line trials, pilot batches, and component readiness with Packaging Engineering and Process Engineering.
• Conduct post-launch evaluations to identify process inefficiencies, lessons learned, and improvement opportunities.
• Collaborate with Scheduling and Outside Sales to support capacity alignment and execution readiness.
• Support continuous improvement initiatives related to launch execution, project visibility, and cross-functional processes. Maintain limited ERP updates (item setup, PAD-aligned dates, demand entry) as needed to keep project timelines accurate.
• Foster strong internal partnerships and communication channels to improve launch performance.
• Utilize AI and automation tools to improve project coordination, reporting, risk identification, and process efficiency.

• Proficiency with project management platforms, including , Microsoft Project, Smartsheet, or equivalent systems.
• Proficiency with Microsoft Office Suite, including Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and Teams.
• Ability to manage multiple projects, priorities, and deadlines simultaneously in a fast-paced environment.
• Strong organizational and time management skills.
• Strong verbal and written communication skills with the ability to effectively communicate with customers, suppliers, and cross-functional teams.
• Ability to identify project risks, evaluate impacts, and develop mitigation plans.
• Ability to facilitate meetings, drive action items, and hold stakeholders accountable to project commitments.
• Understanding of project lifecycle…