Sr Manager Operational Excellence

About Kennametal

With over 85 years as an industrial technology leader, Kennametal Inc. delivers productivity to customers through materials science, tooling and wear-resistant solutions. Customers across aerospace and defense, earthworks, energy, general engineering and transportation turn to Kennametal to help them manufacture with precision and efficiency. Learn more at kennametal.com. Follow @Kennametal: Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn and YouTube.

Sr. Operational Excellence Manager

Location - Can be based in Bedford, Pa, Asheboro, NC, or Orwell, OH

Travel - Role will require travel up to 50%

The Sr. Operational Excellence Manager, the role is to manage the activities of plant operational excellence personnel and lead continuous improvement initiatives within the multi-sites/plants in your region. You will be responsible for implementing strategies, frameworks, and methodologies to enhance operational efficiency, streamline processes, and optimize performance on a multiple plants scale. You will collaborate with site management and cross-functional teams to identify improvement opportunities, establish and share best practices, and foster a culture of operational excellence.

Sr. OpEX Manage role is to lead by example in Lean standards and Kaizen principle.

Key Responsibilities

LEAN NETWORK COMPETENCES

• Develop the lean competences of sites of the region and help sites to become autonomous in continuous improvement management.

LEAN STRATEGIES

• Deploy Global Lean Strategies and the associated standards, methodologies, and tools in the responsible sites/plants in region.
• Work closely with regional manufacturing directors/Plant/Site Managers, and Plant / Site OpEX Managers to define lean priorities, action plans and approaches.

LEAN GENBA ACTIVITIES

• Make timely diagnosis of lean methodologies and tools and practice On Job Training on his/her sites.
• Collaborate with site-level Opex Managers to drive Kaizen workshop execution and monitor progress.
• Coach Plant operation teams: Plant/Site Managers, Production Managers, Plant / Site OpEX Managers, Production Supervisors et al to deliver training sessions, workshops, and coaching to enhance Lean knowledge and skills within the region.
• Ensure consistency in approach, share best practices, and facilitate knowledge transfer among different locations, promote a culture of continuous learning and improvement across all sites.

LEAN RESULTS

• Participate in the definition of lean budget guidelines.
• Establishes performance metrics and monitors progress towards improvement goals. Able to analyze data and performance reports from each site to identify trends, areas of concern, and opportunities for improvement.
• Report performance updates to senior management and provide insights for decision-making.

LEAN CONTRIBUTION

• Standardization and best practice sharing: He/she promotes standardization of OpEx practices and processes across the region. He/she facilitates the sharing of best practices, success stories, and lessons learned among different sites. He/she develops and maintain a repository of tools, templates, and guidelines to support continuous improvement efforts.
• Change management and stakeholder engagement: Implementing Lean or OpEx initiatives at a regional/multi-plants level, requires effective change management and stakeholder engagement. Able to collaborate with site leadership, functional heads, and employees at various levels to gain buy-in, address resistance, and ensure successful adoption of Lean practices. He/she communicates the benefits and impact of improvement initiatives and provide guidance throughout the change process.

SITE SUPPORT DURING OPERATION CRISIS

• Support crisis site with task force working group

LEAN NETWORK COMPETENCES

• Support the Plant/Site Managers, Production Managers and Plant / Site OpEX Managers to understand the lean strategies and apply the lean tools.
• Support the production supervisors to understand the importance of the respect of the standards and their improvement role.
• Ensure that Plant/Site OpEX Managers network is fulfilled at right level for success.
• Manage the Plant / Site OpEX Managers network of the region: annual professional competences appraisal, contribution & validation to recruitment, definition of training plan, validation of annual appraisal and manage detection/growing of local lean potentials. Organize network meeting and On Job
• Training.

Organize the cross sites sharing of good practices within the product family or region.

LEAN STRATEGIES

• Ensure that lean rules are taken into account in new projects at right time.
• Validate the Sites lean deployment plan vs Global directives & instructions, and Sites Priorities, including smart factory (industrial 4.0/digital tools) development, and support their deployment.
• Help the Plant / Site Managers identify opportunities for SQDCIP improvement.
• Deploy and follow Global initiatives within his/her region.
• Check through a regular presence on every Site of his/her region that Sites are working on appropriate priorities.
• Agent of region lean culture change.

LEAN GENBA ACTIVITIES

• Coach Plant / Site Managers : Plant, Production, OpEX, Production & Supply Chain support functions on lean processes implementation.
• Check regularly genba in depth the proper deployment of lean roadmaps and ensure a close follow up of progress plans.

LEAN RESULTS

• Challenge the budget, lean related financial indicators of sites in budget preparation phase.
• Validate, challenge & follow Direct Labor and OEE improvement actions.
• Ensure a regional lean reporting, KOS metrics correct.
• Lean mission report within 3 working days after site visit, share with site and regional management visit summary and quarterly focus alignment.

LEAN CONTRIBUTION

• Contribute to the improvement of Global lean standards & tools and external benchmarking.
• Participate to global lean workshops , Committees & Working group.
• Contribute in selected Global lean initiatives upon request.

SITE SUPPORT DURING OPERATION CRISIS

• Troubleshooting and help building progress roadmaps for sites when in crisis.
• Critical workshop, task force team driver.

Requirements

• Bachelors degree required, prefer STEM or Industrial Engineering area of study
• 6-Sigma greenbelt or black belt is plus
• At least 10 years with demonstrated success in manufacturing, quality, engineering, lean/6-sigma, and /or supply chain experience. Knowledge and practice experience of the following tools:

1. Strong leadership, communication, teaching, and coaching skills.

2. 5S and visual controls.

3. Standard work

4. OEE and time study.

5. Muda Hunting

6. Pull system/ Kanban.

7. SMED.

8. TPM.

9. VSM