Director of Operations

At a Glance

Legrand has an exciting opportunity for a Director of Operations to join the Legrand Lighting Manufacturing Team in Kenosha, WI. As the Director of Operations, you will be responsible for Legrand Lighting Manufacturing site.  The responsibility of this position will include oversight of Safety, Production, Purchasing, Operations Excellence/Legrand Way, Receiving and Shipping teams.  This person will be leading plant leadership driving safety, productivity both in labor and material and achieving OTD goal daily.  You will be part of the operations senior leadership team and will work with peers of other functional areas to meet company objectives. 

This position is responsible to meet or exceed the annual operating plan and continuously drive improvements in safety, quality, delivery, inventory, productivity and operational aspects of our Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) roadmap.

What Will You Do?

• Provide strategic and operational leadership for all day-to-day manufacturing activities across multiple sites, ensuring alignment with Legrand Lighting Manufacturing’s safety, quality, delivery, cost, and growth objectives.
• Lead, coach, and develop Plant Managers, to drive performance outcomes in safety, quality, delivery, inventory, productivity, and employee engagement.
• Establish and monitor key operational metrics, leveraging data analytics to assess performance trends, identify gaps, and drive timely corrective actions to ensure targets are achieved. 
• Drive operational excellence initiatives focused on improving throughput, reducing production costs, optimizing inventory and work-in-process levels, and enhancing overall manufacturing efficiency. 
• Partner closely with Sales and Commercial teams to ensure operational readiness supports revenue goals, on-time delivery (OTD), and customer satisfaction commitments. 
• Champion a culture of continuous improvement and capability building, providing direct coaching and mentorship to site leadership teams and developing succession pipelines across locations. 
• Lead the deployment, standardization, and continuous optimization of “Legrand Way” (Legrand’s Lean Manufacturing System) across all facilities, partnering with LNCA Lean Sensei to embed lean principles and sustain results. 
• Maintain full accountability for Environmental, Health & Safety (EHS) across all sites, ensuring regulatory compliance, proactive risk mitigation, and continuous improvement in safety performance. 
• Oversee supply chain purchasing alignment, partnering with Plant Managers and Purchasing/Planning teams to ensure material availability, drive cost improvements, and mitigate supply chain risk. 
• Collaborate cross-functionally with Marketing, Engineering, Sales, HR, IT, Finance, and Logistics leaders to ensure seamless execution of operational and business strategies. 
• Build, develop, and retain high-performing teams, fostering leadership accountability, engagement, and talent succession across all sites. 
• Perform additional duties and strategic initiatives as required to support operational scalability and business growth.

Required Skills

Qualifications:

Education:  Bachelor’s degree in Engineering, Operations Management, Business, or related field required. MBA strongly desired.

Experience:  

• 10+ years of progressive manufacturing leadership experience.
• Minimum 5+ years leading multi-site operations or serving as a Plant Manager in a complex manufacturing environment.
• Proven experience driving Lean transformation and operational excellence initiatives.
• Demonstrated success leading large teams and developing senior leaders.12-15 years of demonstrated success in operations with increasing responsibility. 

Location:     Chicagoland area – between Kenosha WI/ Chicago area

Skills/Knowledge/Abilities:

• Ability to travel up to 40% of the time to be onsite at all locations,
• Demonstrated skills in Lean; IE; VSM, Kaizen, TPM, 5S, Pull, kitting, single piece flow, Takt time analysis, standard work, visual management, DFA, DFM and 7-ways.
• Knowledge, understanding and development of operational strategy in a manufacturing environment to align with market requirements.
• Excellent management skills, timely decision making, effective delegation needed to ensure brand strategy is successfully implemented and financial objectives are met.
• Must possess strong analytical skills and the ability to identify trends and establish proactive corrective actions. Must be able to apply principles of logical or scientific thinking to a wide range of intellectual and practical problems.
• Must have excellent verbal and written communications skills and be able to communicate effectively across all levels of the organization. Must be an effective listener, able to maintain focus extract necessary information and validate understanding of the information.
• Capable to drive results working cross functionally, influencing others at all levels of the organization.
• Capability to manage large projects and stakeholders ranging from LNCA Executives to the shop floor.
• Demonstrated relationship building, teamwork and collaboration at all levels of the organization.

About Legrand

Legrand is the global specialist in electrical and digital building infrastructures. Our comprehensive offering of solutions for residential, commercial, and data center markets makes us a benchmark for customers worldwide. We harness technological and societal trends with lasting impacts on buildings with the purpose of improving life by transforming the spaces where people live, work, and meet with electrical and digital infrastructures and connected solutions that are simple, innovative, and sustainable. Legrand is a global, publicly traded company listed on the Euronext (Legrand SA EPA: LR). For more information, visit www.legrandgroup.com/en

About Legrand North and Central America

Legrand, North & Central America (LNCA) is a leader in the AV, Lighting & Controls, Electrical, and Data Center markets. LNCA offers comprehensive medical, dental, and vision coverage, as well as distinctive benefits like a high employer 401K match, paid time off (PTO) and holiday pay, short-term and long-term disability benefit plans, above-benchmark paid maternity and parental leave, bonus opportunities in accordance with the Company’s incentive plans, paid time off to volunteer, and an active/growing Employee Resource Group network. For more information, visit legrand.us 

About Legrand’s Lighting Sector

Legrand’s Lighting Sector consists of five lighting brands; Pinnacle, Finelite, Focal Point, and OCL which focus on architectural, decorative, and downlighting and Kenall which focuses on lighting for demanding environments.  We employ a talented group of employees that love lighting to design and manufacture high performance, energy efficient LED lighting solutions for applications in commercial, educational, healthcare, as well as challenging environments such as tunnels and correctional facilities.  With an eye toward sustainable design, our focus is on specification-oriented products and solutions that meet the functional needs of spaces while working in harmony with the designer’s vision for those spaces. We work with architects, engineers, and contractors to supply lighting built specifically for their client’s projects.   

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Equal Opportunity Employer