Engineering Project Manager

Who is Great Lakes Cheese?

Great Lakes Cheese is celebrating over 50 years of Excellence in Cheese Making! Since 1958, Great Lakes has grown rapidly by acquisition, plant expansions, investment in the best technologies for production and distribution - and by setting high industry standards for service. Currently, Great Lakes serves the nation's retailers and food service operations with nine strategic facilities across the U.S. We earn this proud tradition of award-winning quality and customer satisfaction every day.

GLC's Mission:

To be a leading manufacturer and supplier of consistently high quality cheese products. We will achieve this through our commitment to outstanding customer service, innovation, dedicated employees, and business partnerships. Our environment of open communication, integrity, and mutual respect encourages everyone to go beyond what is expected. We believe that profitability is a success only if the customer, the suppliers, the employees, the communities, and the company benefit.

Benefits of working at GLC:

Great Lakes Cheese's success hinges on the dedication and professionalism of our people. From our inception, we have created and maintained an environment for employees to learn, develop their careers and enjoy mutually rewarding relationships, recognition and earnings. As we have grown throughout the years, we have kept the small company, family feel, even as a billion dollar organization. Point in case, our employees participate in an ESOP Plan, where they own approximately 20% of the company. In addition, we offer competitive benefits that include Medical, Dental, Life and Long-term Disability Insurance, 401(k) Plan, an Employee Assistance Program and tuition reimbursement.

The Project Manager will support capital projects across the enterprise and provide technical leadership across the technical community on continuous improvement opportunities. The Project Manager will support technical leadership from ideation and concepts through exploration of options and technologies, apply critical thinking to make recommendations, and participate and contribute to the overall success of capital installations and ramp up.

RESPONSIBILITIES

* Responsible for managing capital projects and supervise contractors with assigned project responsibilities.

* Develop short range and long range capital plans for multiple facilities.

* Manage emerging issues from suppliers, contractors and subcontractors and manage changes with minimal disruption to overall project objectives.

* Provide technical expertise for investigation and resolution of process/packaging deviations, development and interpretation of data trending, review and approval of change controls and preparation of regulatory filings.

* Understand line layouts and support plant requests for design and line layouts changes.

* Work collaboratively with shop floor systems, plant employees, lead the team through root-cause investigations, identify cost savings opportunities, and drive process efficiencies.

* Provide process subject matter expertise for regulatory inspections and other interactions with regulatory agencies.

* Support process technology transfer from OEMs to GLC teams, process validation and the preparation of documentation.

* Lead cross-functional teams for new product start-ups or other process changes.

* Direct department activities to modify existing designs, improve production techniques, and develop test procedures.

* Resolve problems using solutions that involve new techniques, technologies, or concepts.

* Analyze technology trends, human resource needs, and market demand to plan projects.

* Confer with management, production, and marketing staff to determine engineering feasibility, cost effectiveness, and customer demand for new and existing products.

* Advise management of new developments which may affect profit, schedule, costs, customer relations, and/or inter-departmental relations.

* Provide direction of company policies and procedures to the engineering activities.

* Maintain a working knowledge of new technologies which may improve operations, and develop recommendations accordingly.

* Capital Project Management:

o Collaborate with key stakeholders to develop success criteria.

o When necessary, competitively bid projects.

* Outline the project success criteria for timeline, start up, throughput, quality, etc.

* Confirm the RFP has current T&C doc and FAT expectations.

o Review the submitted responses to the RFP and prepare a bid tab on the budgetary side and on the technical comparisons of each vendor.

o Prepare purchase orders (contract) with line item detail to match the deliverables, performance, timeline etc.

o Project execution including but not limited to; planning, design review, FAT, installation and ramp up until deliverables are achieved.

o Project ownership for cost, schedule & performance.

* All GLC employees are expected to perform any assignment or job task according to the stated safety policies and procedures.

* All GLC employees are expected to produce and promote our products and services in a manner that exceeds the quality and value expectation of our customers and consumers by adhering to Good Manufacturing Practices, Policies and Procedures outlined in our Safe Quality Food Program.

* Other responsibilities as assigned by the manager.

REQUIRED EDUCATION, EXPERIENCE AND SKILLS

* Project management and CPG equipment experience including sanitary design and SQF requirements in a food manufacturing environment.

* Bachelor's degree in Engineering or related field.

* 10 years of experience in the food industry or more.

* Proficient in AutoCAD and Microsoft Office including Excel, Visio, Project, and Word.

* Mastery of GMPs and the know how to work and manage within a regulatory environment.

* Strong technical, managerial, leadership, cost consciousness, organizational, and communication skills taking projects from concept development to commercialization stages.

* Excellent verbal & written communications skills. Interpersonal and facilitation skills necessary to interface with and influence all levels of the organization with the ability to lead people and multi-disciplinary teams.

* Strong problem solving and hands on trouble shooting skills.

* Excellent attention to detail on multiple simultaneous tasks.

* Up to 50% travel.

PREFERRED EDUCATION, EXPERIENCE AND SKILLS

* SAP experience.

* MES experience.

* OSHA 10hr Safety Certification

* Lean manufacturing and CI experience.

WORKING CONDITIONS

* Work is performed in both an office environment and manufacturing facilities.

* Occasional exposure to industrial operations including: temperature extremes from approximately 35??F to 100??F; noise levels in excess of 85 dB; moisture and moving machinery.

Great Lakes Cheese is an equal opportunity employer and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, disability status, protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law.