Process Engineer

Dispatch Goods is building the smart infrastructure that makes reuse work  partner with food service operators, workplaces, universities, hospitals, and other institutions to collect, wash, inspect, and redistribute reusable food packaging. Our operations combine industrial washing, technology, logistics, and hands-on problem-solving to replace single-use packaging with a reliable, cost-effective reuse system.

Dispatch Goods is building the smart infrastructure that makes reuse work  partner with food service operators, workplaces, universities, hospitals, and other institutions to collect, wash, inspect, and redistribute reusable food packaging. Our operations combine industrial washing, technology, logistics, and hands-on problem-solving to replace single-use packaging with a reliable, cost-effective reuse system.

TLDR:
You LOVE breaking down processes and rebuilding them more efficiently. Saving pennies is your drug of choice.

We are looking for a hands-on Process Lead to make our packaging‑cleaning operations faster, more consistent, and less labor‑intensive, without compromising food safety, product quality, or employee safety.

Your primary objective will be to reduce labor cost per unit washed. You will spend most of your time on the production floor observing work, measuring where time is spent, identifying bottlenecks, testing improvements, and helping frontline teams adopt better ways of working. You are willing to roll up your sleeves to test hypotheses. The opportunity may involve changes to staffing models, line balancing, workstation layout, standard work, scheduling, training, equipment settings, automation, or upstream decisions that affect how difficult packaging is to clean.

This is not a “desk‑only” continuous improvement role. You will understand the heartbeat of the plant. The right person is equally comfortable analyzing operating data, working side by side with hourly employees, and making practical changes in a fast‑moving facility.

We have 3 facilities, so 50% travel will be needed to ensure each facility is optimized (Hayward, Orange County, and Baltimore).

Dispatch Goods follows a first‑principles manufacturing approach inspired by the five‑step algorithm used at Tesla and SpaceX, and we strongly believe the order is critical.

• Question every requirement. Understand why each constraint, specification, or process exists, and who owns it, rather than treating current practice as fixed.
• Delete unnecessary parts and steps. Remove work, touches, handoffs, inspections, movements, and requirements that do not create value or protect safety and quality.
• Simplify and optimize. Once unnecessary work is removed, make the remaining process easier, more reliable, and more ergonomic.
• Accelerate cycle time. Increase throughput and shorten feedback loops only after the process itself is sound.
• Automate last. Use automation to scale a process that has already been challenged, reduced, and simplified, not to hardwire waste or complexity.

The Process Lead will apply this sequence rigorously to packaging cleaning. The goal is not merely to make the existing process incrementally faster; it is to continually reconsider what work should exist at all.

• Validate current baselines for labor hours, units per labor hour, and labor cost per unit across each step of the cleaning process.
• Identify the biggest sources of lost labor productivity, including bottlenecks, rework, downtime, unnecessary motion, changeovers, poor line balance, and inconsistent work methods.
• Design and run rapid improvement experiments, measure results, and scale the changes that work.
• Apply Dispatch Goods' five‑step improvement…