Plant Manager

About the Company

Kennametal Inc. brings over 85 years of leadership in industrial technology, specializing in materials science, tooling, and wear-resistant solutions. Its products and services cater to aerospace and defense, earthworks, energy, engineering, and transportation sectors, supporting precision manufacturing and efficiency.

Position Overview

The Plant Manager role, based in Huntsville, Alabama, holds overall accountability for the operation of the facility. This leadership position is tasked with defining a clear vision aligned with business objectives to drive revenue growth, profitability, customer satisfaction, manufacturing excellence, strategic planning, and talent development.

Primary Responsibilities

• Manage full profit and loss accountability alongside plant operational performance.
• Collaborate with leadership teams across Manufacturing, Maintenance, Engineering, Quality, Supply Chain, Finance, EHS, and HR to set and execute plant objectives, ensuring operations remain on schedule and budget; oversee operational and capital expenditure planning.
• Standardize key plant metrics related to safety, quality, supply, and delivery; monitor these metrics, provide coaching to resolve deviations, and foster a culture based on accountability and teamwork.
• Champion a safety-first culture, embedding manufacturing safety accountability throughout the plant.
• Drive continuous improvement and employee engagement to optimize plant operations, enhance production and maintenance efficiency, reduce total costs, and uphold quality standards that meet or surpass customer expectations, while ensuring equipment reliability and employee responsibility.
• Advance operational capabilities by utilizing automation and lean manufacturing methodologies.
• Build frontline leadership capacity through mentoring, training, and coaching initiatives.

Required Qualifications and Experience

• Substantial experience in operations leadership within a manufacturing environment with relevant scale and intricacy.
• Expertise in materials management and supply chain leadership.
• Proven success leading lean manufacturing and continuous improvement initiatives to reduce costs and improve productivity.
• Experience in a manufacturing setting of significant scale: overseeing over 100 employees, multiple product lines, and assets exceeding $200 million.
• Bachelor’s degree, preferably in engineering or a related technical discipline.
• Minimum 15 years of manufacturing experience with progressive leadership roles.
• Proven production leadership overseeing at least two management layers, grounded in a disciplined operational management approach.
• Self-motivated, adaptable, proactive, with a strong drive for delivering results and motivating others.
• Exceptional written and verbal communication skills, effective with both internal teams and external stakeholders.

Additional Information and Conditions

Candidates must be legally permitted to work in the United States without needing current or future employment sponsorship. Kennametal Inc. is committed to equal employment opportunity across all applicants.