• Productivity Leader

    W. R. Grace (Columbia, MD)


    Productivity Leader

     

    Date:Oct 8, 2025

     

    Company: W. R. Grace & Co.

     

    Annual Wage Range:$136,000.00 - $187,000.00

    Other Compensation: Eligibility for the Short-Term Incentive program and other applicable bonuses

    Benefits: U.S. Employee Benefits Summary (grace.com) (https://grace.com/people-and-careers/benefits/us-employee-benefits-summary/)

     

    Grace, a Standard Industries company, is a leading global supplier of catalysts, engineered materials and fine chemicals. We provide innovative products, technologies and services which our customers use to manufacture everyday products like renewable fuels, pharmaceuticals, toothpaste, cosmetics, food packaging, beer, edible oils and more. Our thousands of employees help shape a better future at our global headquarters in Columbia, MD and locations worldwide.

    Job Description

    We’re hiring a Productivity Leader who will report to the Manufacturing Center of Excellence Leader, Global Operations. This role is accountable to develop, implement and sustain process improvement initiatives utilizing Lean and Six Sigma methodologies and transform the current culture to a culture of continuous improvement. These process improvement initiatives are driven throughout the organization and often extended to suppliers and customers. The expectation is to deliver long-term, breakthrough results in the areas of safety, volume, and cost. This position will be working on projects driving productivity, ensuring productivity targets are achieved across one of the three Grace Regional Manufacturing teams, coordinating on safety improvements with EH&S and supporting the Vice President Regional Manufacturing.

     

    The ability to travel up to 25% will also be required.

     

    Responsibilities (1 of 2)

     

    + Champion a culture of continuous improvement, facilitating continuous improvement initiatives that include Kaizen events, engineering projects, daily improvement activities, advanced problem solving or Six Sigma projects, 5S, visual management, and lean principles.

    + Track the progress of project objectives and the projects value driver (OEE, yield, cost, etc.), provide root cause analysis when performance deviates from target, and work with team members to develop data driven corrective actions to remediate misses to project deliverables.

    + Manage the translation of plant KPI boards, monthly operating review documents, site productivity performance, into the continuous improvement and employee idea funnels, and plant 5S and hazard audit programs.

    + Lead ideation process for productivity projects with plant teams and prioritize those projects with the asset teams.

    + Oversee the development and maintenance of the site continuous improvement roadmap, ensuring that the roadmap aligns with key business objectives, roadmap activities are clearly communicated to key stakeholders, projects and events are resourced effectively, and results are updated monthly

    + Partner with business asset teams to develop Growth projects in the FEL0 and FEL1 stages.

    + Partner with business asset teams to drive key initiatives and transformation activities that improve KPI’s and other business performance indicators such as ROI, margin improvement.

     

    Responsibilities (2 of 2)

     

    + Work with value stream owners to create a system to ensure everyone is conducting the continuous improvement principles correctly and consistently.

    + Assist in the development and management of a best practice sharing internal network supported by Safety, Volume, and Cost.

    + Provide monthly and quarterly performance reports as assigned.

    + Analyze prior year performance, facilitate multi-year gap closure plans, and help set KPI plans / targets for next several years.

    + Mentor black belts and green belts.

    + Align with Asset Teams ensuring a one Grace approach to programs and platforms.

    + Work with plant managers and operations leaders to develop a sustained pool of Six Sigma talent.

    + Ability to follow safety protocols and standards working in a laboratory environment with highly hazardous materials

    Required Qualifications

    + BS degree in ISE, ChE, ME, EE.

    + Minimum of 12 years or more work experience in operational excellence, training, consulting, strategy, process improvement, or business analysis required.

    + Ability to develop and lead changes and improvements in a large-scale operation.

    + Strong partner management, communication, and interpersonal skills.

    + Drives Value Stream strategy with manufacturing engineering personnel relative to process and equipment to improve production and quality of products.

    Preferred Qualifications

    + MBA or equivalent work experience

    + Exhibits outstanding team building skills and ability to influence indirectly

    + Experience in transforming organizations using Lean & Six Sigma methodologies.

    + Leads Lean Manufacturing initiatives to eliminate waste of value streams by empowering/teaching others the Lean and practical problem-solving tools.

     

    Benefits

     

    + Medical, Dental, Vision Insurance

    + Life Insurance and Disability

    + Grace Wellness Program

    + Flexible Workplace

    + Retirement Plans

    + 401(k) Company Match

    + Paid Vacation and Holidays

    + Parental Leave

    + Tuition Reimbursement

    + Company Donation Match Program

     

    Grace is not accepting unsolicited assistance from search firms for this employment opportunity. Please, no phone calls or emails. All resumes submitted by search firms to any employee at Grace via email, the Internet or in any form and/or method without a valid written search agreement in place for this position will be deemed the sole property of Grace. No fee will be paid in the event the candidate is hired by Grace as a result of the referral or through other means.

     

    Nearest Major Market:Baltimore

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