Director, Manufacturing Operations

Role purpose

Own end-to-end manufacturing performance at a new, highly automated beverage plant: safe, compliant, on-plan delivery at the right quality and cost. The role leads production, warehouse operations, maintenance and production planning as one integrated system, and builds an organization where decisions sit with the people closest to the work.

The plant, systems and team are new. The incumbent will take operations from ramp-up to stable, benchmark performance, and will shape the standards, routines and culture the site runs on for years.

The role is part of Plant leadership team and provides an opportunity to shape the strategy and vision for the site.

The context you will lead in-

Highly automated plant. Liquid manufacturing, high-speed filling lines and a fully automated warehouse (ASRS, robotic palletizing, AGVs and AMRs), integrated through SAP, MES and batch control.

Lean, ownership-based operating model. Area Owners operate and maintain their equipment; Technical Associates provide electrical and instrumentation depth on demand. There is no team lead layer by design.

Phased ramp-up. Additional lines and manufacturing rooms come online in phases while running lines must hit committed market volumes.

Excellence built in. Autonomous Maintenance, reliability-centred maintenance and structured capability building are being embedded from day one.

Key accountabilities

• Safety and compliance
• Lead a safety culture where everyone stops unsafe work and owns their risk: LOTO, permit to work, pre-task risk assessment and behaviour-based safety as daily routine.
• Ensure operational compliance with labour, factory safety, food safety, environmental and equipment regulations, with clear owners and evidence for every obligation.
• Production delivery and ramp-up
• Deliver the ramp-up plan for each line and product family, including qualification and verification of new lines.
• Drive OEE, right-first-time quality and conversion cost through structured loss analysis.
• Partner with Quality to build in-process quality ownership on the shop floor, reducing reliance on downstream inspection.
• Production planning and customer delivery
• Own the master production schedule and finite schedule, balancing customer demand, changeovers, maintenance windows and material availability.
• Deliver OTIF and plan adherence; lead the operations input to S&OP.
• Manage exceptions (material shortages, demand changes, breakdowns) through defined decision rights, not escalation.
• Warehouse operations
• Stabilise and optimise automated warehouse performance: availability, throughput, inventory accuracy and dispatch OTIF.
• Integrate warehouse, production and planning so material flow is seamless end to end.
• Hold automation partners to performance through clear SLAs and joint problem solving.
• Maintenance and asset reliability
• Lead a maintenance strategy built on three pillars: reliability-centred maintenance, Autonomous Maintenance and capability building.
• Shift the maintenance mix from reactive to planned; drive MTBF, MTTR and PM compliance.
• Own critical spares strategy and maintenance cost.
• People, capability and culture
• Build leader-leader behaviours: push decisions to where the information is, coach rather than direct.
• Progress every associate up a visible capability ladder; build succession for each functional lead.
• Establish standards, daily management routines and a no-blame, high-accountability culture.
• Continuous improvement and digital
• Run structured loss elimination and continuous improvement routines across all four functions.
• Use MES, SCADA and warehouse system data to make decisions on the floor; drive adoption of digital tools that make execution easier.
• Build a pipeline of improvements that sustain gains after ramp-up.
  
  

Experience

• 10 to 12 years in manufacturing operations, with at least 5 years leading multi-function plant operations (production plus maintenance and/or warehouse).
• Track record in FMCG or similar process and packaging environment.
• Led a greenfield / brownfield start-up, major expansion or ramp-up through to stable performance.
• Demonstrated results in IWS / IL6S or equivalent operational excellence programs, demonstrating deep understanding of autonomous Maintenance, reliability engineering, capability building and structured loss elimination.
• Exposure to automated warehousing, MES or digitally integrated plants (strongly preferred).
  
  

Education

• Engineering degree (mechanical, electrical, chemical or electronics). MBA or post-graduate qualification in industrial engineering or operations preferred.