Aspire Bakeries is a North American baking company with a leadership position in specialty frozen baked goods.
Formed from leading bakery companies, its innovative food portfolio includes breads, artisan breads, buns, cookies, donuts, muffins and pastries from beloved brands like La Brea Bakery®, Otis Spunkmeyer®, and Oakrun Farm Bakery®.
With 13 bakeries in North America, we are committed to driving innovation, predicting upcoming consumer trends and flavors, and exceeding our customers’ expectations.
Aspire Bakeries champions the values of Integrity, Ownership, Customer Focus, Creativity and Care to help us deliver on People Safety, Food Safety, Quality and Collaboration.
Continuous Improvement ManagerPosition Purpose:Continuous Improvement Manager will provide a full range of productivity services to Operations and direct cost reduction programs for the facility including leading lean events, implementing buy in throughout the facility, developing, measuring and challenging facility systems and developing and delivering continuous improvement training programs for the facility.
Direction in disciplines of best business practices including, but not limited to, World Class yield improvement, manpower utilization, overhead spend, capital utilization, indirect spend, plant utilization and efficiency, working capital both raw material and finished goods.
Key incumbent will act as a SME for his peers and the facility.
This person will work closely with facility leadership team to drive greater utilization of processes and procedures and higher proficiency on the changes impacting employees in the organization such that business results are achieved.
This person will provide direct support and coaching to front line managers, supervisors and team leaders as they help their direct reports understand and adopt World Class Lean Manufacturing mythologies .Improving processes and practices at the plant floor level where changes are implemented to improve financial results and to create higher levels of food and personnel safety.
ResponsibilitiesThis position will lead the plant leadership team in developing building the pillars for the plant’s overall Lean Transformation Plan in alignment with the Bakery director and corporateThis position will lead Lean projects for improvement results that can be leveraged across plants, functions, and product lines.Ensures that Lean/CI training, tools, best practices and resources are available to employees at all levels and are being utilized appropriately and effectively.Develops and executes a communication plan to support the rollout and education on continuous improvement to the facility.Lead or coach focused improvement activities and teams to improve results of safety, quality, delivery, cost and inventory and conduct root-cause analysis and coaching to resolve production issues.Coach and teach the daily management process to salary & hourly alike as well aswork and coach on improving machine performance and workflow.Establish current & future state value stream maps by value stream and establish Vale Stream Matrix and lead all Kaizen events & activities.Analyze and improve work and measure performance.Coach the process of developing and deploying effective standard work practices across the plant also share and reapply proven methods from other locations as appropriate.Facilitate and co-facilitate various CI related workshops and training events.Teach the concepts and coach the plant personnel to see and eliminate waste.
Works with the Bakery Director and plant leadership in analyzing key performance indicators to make the plant better measure, visualize, analyze, improve, report and implement CI’s based upon key performance indicators.Leads execution & commissioning of capital projects to achieve return on investment.
Skills, Experience & QualificationsContinuous improvement project experience, training and development, TPM, 6’s and Lean Six-Sigma.Experience in leading Lean Transformations in manufacturing operations, educating others on Lean principles and deployment planning.The position requires high level of creativity, exceptional organization and project management skills and thinking out of the box.Must be able to coordinate all operational aspects of diverse project work and work productively with a wide range of people and job levels, both internally and externally to achieve objectives.Demonstrated ability to apply critical thought processes to develop, recommend and implement strategies and programs that address plant and corporate objectives.Outstanding written and oral communication skills up and down the organizational hierarchy to include corporate offices.Strong project management, organizational, analytical, presentation and people skills.
Education, Technical Qualifications, Experience and Competencies Proficiency LevelRequiredBachelor’s degree (B.A.) or equivalent; or minimum 5 years of experience in leading Lean Transformations in manufacturing operationsContinuous Improvement experience; TPM, and Lean Six-SigmaBlack Belt Certification preferred.Work well under pressure in a fast-paced environment and maintain confidentiality of all interactions and communications.Able to handle multiple tasks with capability of prioritizing and planning work activities.Excellent verbal and written communicationExcellent project management capability.Demonstrate accuracy and thoroughness with ability to improve and promote quality.PreferredBilingual English / Spanish preferredPhysical RequirementsThe physical demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job.
Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.While performing the duties of this job, the employee is frequently required to stand; walk and use hands to finger, handle, or feel.
The employee is occasionally required to sit; reach with hands and arms; climb or balance; talk or hear and taste or smell.The employee must frequently lift and/or move up to 10 pounds and occasionally lift and/or move up to 25 pounds.This position requires employee to have adequate communicating and observational skills, including seeing, speaking and hearing, due to the operation of various types of moving equipment used in the bakery.
Specific vision abilities required by this job include close vision, distance vision, depth perception and color vision.
Work EnvironmentWhile performing the duties of this job, the employee is frequently required to work near moving mechanical parts.The employee is occasionally exposed to wet or humid conditions (non-weather); extreme cold (non-weather) and extreme heat (non-weather), and to rapid changes in temperature.The employee must be able to tolerate a work environment that contains flour dust.
The noise level in the work environment is usually moderate.
At Aspire Bakeries, the health and safety of our associates is our number one priority.
In fact, CARE is one of our Core Values.
That’s why all offers of employment, where legally permitted, are contingent on the candidate showing proof of being fully vaccinated against COVID-19 to pass our pre-employment requirements.Candidates may be legally entitled to a reasonable accommodation if the vaccine is medically contraindicated for them, a medical necessity requires a delay in vaccination, or because of a disability.
Candidates may also be legally entitled to a reasonable accommodation if receiving the vaccine conflicts with a sincerely held religious belief, practice, or observance.
Requests for exemption and reasonable accommodation must be initiated by the candidate prior to date of hire.All medical information collected from candidates, including vaccination information and test results, obtained during the pre-employment process, will be treated in accordance with applicable laws and policies on confidentiality and privacy.
Aspire Bakeries is proud to be an equal opportunity employer.
All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability or veteran status.