Outplant Leader - Plant 3 at Howmet Aerospace in Whitehall, MI

Outplant Leader - Plant 3

Location: Whitehall, MI, United States

The Outplant Leader is responsible for leading the non-exempt salaried employees responsible for handling and transacting the outsourced manufacturing processes. This role manages day-to-day activities involving external machining, heat treat, coating, inspection, and other specialty suppliers, while coordinating internal logistics to ensure customer requirements for quality, cost, and delivery are achieved. The Outplant Leader provides leadership to company and contract personnel, drives supplier performance, ensures adherence to aerospace quality standards, and serves as the primary operational interface between the plant and external manufacturing partners.

The position works cross-functionally with Operations, Supply Chain, Manufacturing Engineering, Quality, Planning, and Customer Service to resolve production issues, improve throughput, reduce lead time, and maintain schedule adherence. The Outplant Leader is expected to champion continuous improvement, develop standardized processes, monitor key performance indicators, and ensure all work is completed in compliance with customer specifications, regulatory requirements, and company safety standards.

Job Roles

• Perspective--understands and anticipates business needs; reviews data to adjust approaches as needed; provides information and justification for decisions; sees gray areas and thinks strategically
• People support--provides information, training, and communication to ensure others are successful; advocates for associates; helps people grow; gives guidance and accountability; inspires, incentivizes and rewards others.
• Coordination--maintains a broad team attitude in working with peers; does what is best for the business and its goals; makes decisions based on inputs from multiple stakeholders; manages multiple areas and shifts; enables continuous improvement efforts while maintaining performance
• Influence-- delegates effectively; capable of explaining the “why” behind a recommendation or directive; advocates for the business; maintains approachability; deals with conflict and change effectively; persuades others to buy in to segment, plant, and team goals.
• Organization and structure--plans daily; coordinates to deliver on time; ensures efficiencies while balancing priorities of multiple projects and stakeholder groups; has contingency plans
• Communication and relationship--builds genuine relationships with associates; maintains ability to discipline constructively; connected to operators and shop floor; translates and disseminates information readily both up and down the chain of command
• Ownership--accepts accountability for the performance of others and the business; inspires ownership and improvement in others; invites measurement; self-motivated; invents and implements ideas for improvement; committed to safety; works at a macro level, not merely focused on single tasks
• Anticipation and Problem Solving--anticipates and identifies problems quickly; works with other functions to create solutions; ensures channels of communication stay open; owns the process of ensuring things function well; elevates issues as needed
• Management and Engagement--recognizes associates for outstanding performance; invites engagement by curating work environment; develops and coaches associates from a strengths-based perspective; aligns talent to tasks; accelerates measurable performance with clear expectations, goal setting and milestones

Responsibilities

• Supervises an effective NES team; includes planning and holding meetings, preparing and conducting performance appraisals as appropriate, managing staffing levels (including vacations, overtime, and leaves of absences), assisting with career development (motivates, coaches, and trains to acquire maximum quality, productivity, morale, and cooperation), approving time and attendance, and prioritizing and making work assignments.
• Provides effective feedback to employees, both positive and negative. Maintains appropriate documentation for all disciplinary actions taken.
• Directs training and orientation of employees to ensure EHS rules are known and understood, to improve work performance, and acquaint employees with company policies and procedures.
• Ensures compliance with company policies, procedures, and practices.
• Schedules production and work team.
• Reviews production and operating reports and resolves operations, manufacturing, and maintenance problems to ensure minimum costs and prevent operational delays.
• Inspects machines and equipment to ensure specific operational performance and optimum utilization.
• Promotes EHS and continuous improvement initiatives and culture.
• Coordinate outsourced machining, inspection, repair, and secondary processing operations.
• Ensure supplier performance aligns with production schedules and customer commitments.
• Drive zero-defect culture across supplier operation.
• Identify and eliminate bottlenecks impacting throughput.
• Support recovery plans for late orders and capacity constraints.
• Develop strong working relationships with supplier leadership teams.
• Conduct routine operational reviews with suppliers.
• Drive accountability for delivery, quality, responsiveness, and continuous improvement.
• Support supplier development initiatives to improve capability and capacity.
• Act as the primary operational contact between the plant and supplier partners.
• Coordinate the transportational logistics of moving products from internal and external suppliers.
• Travel to suppliers as needed.

Basic Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Supply Chain, Business, or related field from an accredited institution
• A minimum of 1 year of leadership experience
• A minimum of 3 years of experience in supply chain
• Employees must be legally authorized to work in the United States. Verification of employment eligibility will be required at the time of hire. Visa sponsorship is not available for this position.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience supervising in a manufacturing environment
• Experience with TPM, Synchronous Mfg., and Kaizen Concepts
• Must be able to communicate effectively with all levels of the organization, have good team building skills, excellent people skills; ability to handle multiple tasks, technically oriented
• Must be energetic and a self-starter, able to promote and implement change, have good PC skills, good telephone skills, strong organizational skills, and ability to promote a continuous improvement atmosphere