Group Director Manufacturing; Chicago

Downers Grove, 3333 Finley Rd, Downers Grove, Illinois, United States of America

Posted Tuesday, February 17, 2026 at 6:00 AM

Position Summary:

The Group Director, Manufacturing leads operational performance across multiple manufacturing facilities. This role directs Site Operations Leaders, ensuring consistent execution of safety, food safety, quality, service, productivity, and cost targets. The position partners closely with Operations, Supply Chain, Finance, HR, Food Safety & Quality, Engineering, R&D, and our Commercial teams to deliver safe, high performing and cost-effective operations. This is a remote role but you must reside in the Chicagoland area.

Responsibilities:

Operational Leadership

• Lead operational performance across multiple manufacturing plants.
• Ensure standardized manufacturing processes, policies, and KPIs across sites.
• Drive adherence to GMP, HACCP, and GFSI (SQF/BRCGS) food safety requirements.
• Oversee production planning, labor optimization, material usage, and equipment utilization.

Safety, Quality & Compliance

• Champion a safety-first culture and ensure compliance with regulatory and internal standards.
• Maintain audit readiness and corrective action processes.
• Uphold high standards in sanitation, quality systems, and documentation.
• Lead Lean, CI, TPM/IWS initiatives to improve OEE, yield, throughput, waste, and cost.
• Implement structured problem solving and loss elimination processes.
• Facilitate best practice sharing and standard work replication across the network.

Digital Transformation & Automation

• Identify and implement automation, digital manufacturing tools (MES/SCADA/CMMS), and analytics that enhance performance.
• Drive data driven decision making and real time visibility of key performance metrics.
• Manage plant financial performance: labor models, conversion costs, capital budgets, inventory health, and cost to serve.
• Improve margin through waste reduction, productivity, mix optimization, and CAPEX execution.

Customer & Commercial Interface

• Support commercialization, capacity planning, and customer requirements.
• Ensure world class fulfillment and performance for strategic CPG partners.
• Oversee customer audits, scorecards, and product launch readiness.
• Lead, coach, and develop Plant Managers and cross functional site leaders.
• Build succession plans and talent pipelines.
• Foster high engagement, accountability, and inclusive leadership.

Qualifications:

• Senior manufacturing leadership experience in food, bakery, snacks, CPG, contract manufacturing, or high‑volume processing; generally, successful applicants typically have a minimum of 12 years of experience in a food manufacturing environment, with packaging experience being a plus.
• Proven multi plant leadership or demonstrated year over year performance improvement at plant level.