Continuous Improvement Manager

Job Description

Job Description

MGS has an exciting opportunity for an experienced Continuous Improvement Manager to join our MGS Germantown team. 

The Continuous Improvement Manager leads the development, deployment, and sustainment of lean manufacturing principles across MGS business units and global manufacturing sites. This role is responsible for building a culture of continuous improvement from the production floor to the executive team by coaching site leaders, facilitating global lean meetings, conducting operational assessments, creating action plans, developing team capabilities, and reporting progress, risks, and results to the executive leadership team.

• Lead the enterprise lean manufacturing strategy across business units, functions, and global manufacturing sites.
• Champion and sustain a culture of continuous improvement, operational discipline, employee engagement, and accountability at all levels of the organization.
• Coach plant leaders, functional leaders, and site teams on their lean journey through structured assessments, gap analysis, roadmap development, and action plan execution.
• Conduct periodic lean maturity assessments and operational diagnostics to identify waste, variation, bottlenecks, and improvement opportunities across safety, quality, delivery, cost, productivity, and employee engagement.
• Develop, prioritize, and manage enterprise continuous improvement initiatives that create measurable business impact and align with strategic goals.
• Facilitate global lean meetings, governance reviews, best-practice sharing, kaizen planning, and cross-site collaboration.
• Report progress, performance trends, financial impact, risks, barriers, and resource needs to the executive leadership team using clear metrics and actionable recommendations.
• Build, develop, and lead a team of lean practitioners, site champions, and cross-functional project leaders capable of driving sustainable improvement.
• Establish and maintain standard lean tools, processes, training materials, visual management systems, and governance mechanisms used across MGS operations.
• Lead and support kaizen events, value stream mapping, standard work, visual management, 5S, SMED, pull systems, problem solving, and other lean initiatives as appropriate.
• Partner with site leadership, operations, quality, engineering, supply chain, human resources, and finance to remove barriers and accelerate improvement execution.
• Ensure continuous improvement initiatives are sustained through follow-up audits, performance reviews, control plans, and leadership accountability.
• Know and follow all Company safety rules, safe work practices, and standard operating procedures while serving as a visible role model for professional and safe behavior.
• Any other duties as assigned.

ABOUT MGS:

As a global provider of healthcare manufacturing solutions, MGS provides the right balance to drive vital innovations: robust end-to-end solutions combined with the strong customer focus and seamless collaboration of an agile partner. That’s why we’re the engineering and manufacturing partner of choice for today’s leading Pharma, Diagnostic and MedTech innovators. Serving customers from 12 strategically located facilities around the world, we transform our customers’ most pressing challenges into innovations that improve lives.   To learn more about MGS, please visit 

A qualified Continuous Improvement Manager   would fulfill these requirements:

• Bachelor’s Degree in Engineering, Operations Management, Business, or a related field required; advanced degree preferred.
• Minimum 5+ years of experience in manufacturing, operations, operational excellence, continuous improvement, or lean transformation; multi-site or global manufacturing experience preferred.
• Minimum 3+ years of leadership experience managing people, project teams, lean practitioners, or cross-functional improvement initiatives.
• Six Sigma Green Belt required; Six Sigma Black Belt, Lean Certification, or equivalent operational excellence certification preferred.
• Demonstrated experience leading lean transformations, kaizen events, value stream mapping, standard work, visual management, 5S, SMED, pull systems, mistake proofing, and structured problem solving.
• Demonstrated ability to assess site maturity, identify gaps, create improvement roadmaps, develop action plans, and follow up to ensure sustainment.
• Strong executive communication skills with the ability to prepare and present performance updates, business cases, financial impact, risks, and recommendations to senior leaders.
• Strong team building, coaching, facilitation, decision making, change management, and people leadership skills.
• Strong troubleshooting, problem-solving, project management, data analysis, and communication skills needed to drive improvement from the production floor to the boardroom.
• Experience in plastics, injection molding, tooling, engineering, operations, or regulated manufacturing environments is preferred.
• Basic knowledge of FDA and ISO/QS/TS Quality Systems is preferred.
• Ability to travel domestically and internationally to support global sites, assessments, workshops, and leadership reviews as business needs require.

MGS is an Equal Opportunity Employer.