Plant Floor Operations Manager (Paper Tube Converting)

Job Description

Job Description

Plant Floor Operations Manager (Paper Tube Converting)

Location: Skokie, IL

Schedule: Monday–Friday, 7:00 AM–4:30 PM

Compensation: $100,000–$115,000 per year

A Day in the Life

At 7:00 AM, you’re on the floor—reviewing yesterday’s KPIs, scanning production boards, and aligning priorities with leads. By mid-morning, you’ve coached an operator through a setup, removed a bottleneck on a recutting machine, and updated an SOP to lock in the win. After lunch, you’re troubleshooting a can seamer, rebalancing labor across two lines, and walking quality, safety, and throughput metrics with the team. You wrap the day ensuring tomorrow’s plan is tight and the crew knows the targets.

The Role

This is a hands-on leadership position overseeing a small manufacturing operation with roughly 20 team members. You’ll guide daily production, standardize processes, elevate safety and quality, and drive efficiency across the plant. It’s a boots-on-the-floor job—not a desk role.

What You’ll Lead

• Daily production control: balance schedules, set priorities, and manage staffing for output and on-time delivery.
• Team leadership for ~20 employees: coach performance, uphold quality, productivity, attendance, and safety standards.
• Process improvement: eliminate bottlenecks, reduce waste and rework, and trim downtime and costs.
• Standardization: build, refine, and implement SOPs to ensure consistent results and reliable throughput.
• Performance management: define metrics, track KPIs, and act quickly on trends in quality, safety, and productivity.
• Technical problem-solving: troubleshoot equipment and production issues; jump in alongside operators to keep lines running.
• Production floor engagement: lead from the line, modeling best practices and safe work every day.

What You Bring

• Background in manufacturing or production management; experience as a Production/Plant/Operations/Manufacturing Manager or similar.
• Strong mechanical aptitude and confidence working with production machinery.
• Proven results improving processes and eliminating bottlenecks in a factory setting.
• Track record managing production teams with a hands-on leadership style.
• Comfort wearing multiple hats and engaging directly on the shop floor.
• Maintenance or mechanical experience is a strong plus.
• Bilingual Spanish/English is a strong plus.

Core Skills

• Leadership and people management
• Project management and continuous improvement
• Equipment, mechanical, and general troubleshooting
• Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) development
• Supervisory experience and production optimization
• Operational metrics and KPI management
• Production planning and scheduling
• Machine setups for production runs
• Shop math proficiency
• Paper tube manufacturing exposure

Equipment You’ll Encounter

• Packaging machines
• Can seamers
• Tube labelers
• Recutting machines

Why This Role

If you’d rather be on the production floor solving problems than sitting behind a screen—and you love turning complex operations into safer, simpler, faster, more efficient systems—this is your opportunity to make an immediate impact.