VP of Operations
REI · Eden Prairie
It's fun to work in a company where people truly BELIEVE in what they're doing!
We're committed to bringing passion and customer focus to the business.
Job Summary:
The Vice President of Operations is responsible for leading the day-to-day execution of all manufacturing and operational activities across the organization. Reporting directly to the President/COO, this role serves as the operational leader responsible for converting strategic priorities into measurable business results through disciplined execution, strong leadership, continuous improvement, and operational excellence.
As part of a private equity-sponsored organization, the Vice President of Operations will play a critical role in supporting the company's growth, EBITDA expansion, and value creation objectives. This leader will drive operational performance across manufacturing, live production, maintenance, engineering, supply chain, logistics, quality, and food safety while developing scalable systems, processes, and teams necessary to support continued growth.
The Vice President of Operations will establish high-performance standards, lead operational improvement initiatives, develop management talent, and ensure facilities consistently deliver against safety, quality, customer service, productivity, and financial objectives.
Duties and Responsibilities:
Operational Leadership & Enterprise Execution
- Champion safety culture to shop floor by demonstrating importance in all daily activities.
- Drive execution of all operational priorities tied to the company's value creation plan.
- Ensure all operational initiatives have clearly defined deliverables, ownership, timelines, milestones, and success metrics.
- Establish disciplined execution processes to ensure projects remain on schedule and achieve expected financial results.
- Conduct regular operational reviews focused on progress against commitments, KPI performance, and timeline adherence.
- Develop action plans and recovery strategies when operational performance falls below expectations.
- Create visibility around business performance through scorecards, dashboards, management reports, and operating reviews.
- Ensure operational commitments made to customers, executive leadership, and ownership are consistently achieved.
- Drive urgency and responsiveness throughout the organization with a focus on execution speed and quality.
- Standardize management practices across facilities to improve consistency, accountability, and operational performance.
Continuous Improvement & Operational Excellence
- Drive root cause analysis and problem-solving methodologies at all levels of the organization.
- Establish management systems that create visibility, accountability, and performance improvement.
- Identify opportunities to improve productivity, reduce waste, lower costs, and improve process reliability.
- Lead cross-functional improvement teams focused on achieving strategic operational objectives.
- Measure, communicate, and sustain operational improvement results.
- Promote innovation and adoption of technologies that increase efficiency, enhance quality, and improve customer service.
Food Safety, Quality & Regulatory Compliance
- Champion a food safety-first culture throughout all operations.
- Ensure compliance with USDA, FDA, FSMA, HACCP, SQF, OSHA, environmental, and company standards.
- Partner with Quality and Food Safety teams to maintain industry-leading compliance programs.
- Ensure facilities maintain audit readiness and successfully achieve regulatory and customer audit requirements.
- Drive continuous improvement in product quality, sanitation, traceability, and customer satisfaction.
- Ensure corrective actions and preventive actions are implemented and sustained.
Required Qualifications
- Bachelor’s degree required; MBA or advanced degree preferred.
- 7-10+ years of senior leadership experience in food, beverage, or CPG industries.
- Proven track record in operational leadership at multiple levels and sites
- Experience executing value-creation initiatives and delivering cost savings from shop floor.
Preferred Qualifications
- Senior operations leadership experience in a private equity-backed or high-growth manufacturing environment.
- Demonstrated ability to translate strategic priorities into operating plans that improve EBITDA, productivity, yield, labor efficiency, and cost performance.
- Strong financial acumen with experience managing operating budgets, capital projects, cost reduction initiatives, working capital, and operational ROI.
- Hands-on, process-oriented operations leader who drives accountability, urgency, problem solving, and disciplined execution across the organization.
- Effective cross-functional leader with the ability to align plant operations with other functional areas in business
Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)
- Safety Performance: TRIR, LTIR, Food Safety Compliance Regulatory Audit Results, SGF/HACCP
- Customer Experience: Exceeding customer expectations on quality and service
- Operational Performance: OEE, Yield, First Pass Quality, Continuous Improvement
- Financial Performance: Budget performance, working capital management, ROI, cost reduction achievement