GPS Director, North America

Griffith Foods is a global manufacturer of food products.  We provide a wide range of taste and texture components for food industry customers throughout the world.  Our products include seasoning blends, dry mixes, coating systems, dough blends, crumbs, flavors, sauces and food bases that are used in an extensive variety of application from snack foods and processed meat and poultry to ready meals. Our customers include food processors, restaurant operators and grocery retailers.  While our name may not be familiar to consumers, our products are key components of foods offered by many of the world’s best-known companies.

Location: Proximity to Work in Alsip IL US, Scarborough, CAN, or Monterrey MX

Summary: Provide strategic direction and leadership to Griffith Foods Lean/GPS teams driving the manufacturing transformation across the region (own sites and businesses, contract manufacturer locations and warehouses). Drive the lean culture, standardize best practices and processes, and facilitate activities using lean and continuous improvement methods to implement Global GPS and GPE in NA region and sites. This position will drive efforts to continuously improve cost competitiveness and productivity while supporting a sustainable operation for employee safety, ergonomics, and the planet.

Essential Duties & Responsibilities:

• Overall responsibility for Griffith Foods NA Region for the Lean/GPS/GPE programs design and compliance, as well as regional policy setting.
• Manages activities related to continuous improvement in the region including GPS playbook deployment, workshop facilitation, GPS assessments, roadmap development and training.
• Ensure alignment to corporate strategy, playbook, and regional priorities.
• Conduct GPS assessments to identify gaps and develop plans to address opportunities to improve assessment maturity.
• Leads and develops plans to standardize GPS programs and best practice across all NA sites.
• Coordination of the GPE process, ideation sessions, project funnel and progress tracking in the region to deliver process improvement goals and financial benefit targets for the region.
• Research, evaluate, and recommend key equipment and/or software technologies to drive automation and cost improvement.
• Work cross functionally to influence and execute change and lead teams directed at key strategic projects within NA manufacturing operations.
• Propose capital investments for the sites as related to Lean/GPS improvement through sound business case.
• Collaborate and review new manufacturing equipment design/installations to meet OEE requirements.
• Shared responsibility in the interviewing, selecting, and hiring new local GPS team members and directing effective onboarding for local GPS employees at the sites.
• Partner with site leadership on defining smart goals for GPS team members, and performance reviews.
• Shared responsibility in the Talent Development Process for staff including reviews, training, coaching, and succession planning.
• Define and ensure continuous cycle of capability development at all levels of the organization by delivering a training plan in alignment to GPS standard body of knowledge.

Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in Supply Chain, Engineering or Operations management or equivalent; Master’s degree is preferred.
• 7-10 years related experience in Food Manufacturing facilities, 5 years in Continuous Improvement roles.
• Ability to partner with regional leadership to understand business priorities and create a strategy deployment plan to deliver results.
• Facilitating root causes for complex problems.
• Strong understanding for DMAIC (define, measure, analyze, improve and control) approach for problem solving.
• Ability to conduct statistical problem analysis to understand process control, process capability, hypothesis testing, and measurement system analysis to understand sources variation and special causes.
• Lean Six Sigma Black Belt or accredited Lean certification.
• TPM/Kaizen training facilitation skills.
• People/Team development and building skills.
• Strong presentation skills and communication skills.
• Excellent problem-solving, organizational, and analytical skills, with the ability to coach and mentor the team.
• Possess the analytical skills to evaluate data and make sound judgments regarding the business.
• Proficient in MS Office Skills, such as Word and Excel.
• Proficiency in Minitab, Power BI, and Project tracking software
• Must be able to travel 35%.

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