ESSENTIAL DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES:Own daily plant execution and production schedule; maximize throughput while balancing quality, maintenance and labor requirements.Plans and directs production activities and establishes production priorities for products in keeping with effective operations and cost factors.Develop budget and cost controls, and obtain data regarding types, quantities, specifications, and delivery dates of parts and equipment ordered.Coordinate operations with agriculture/fruit supply, planning, quality, engineering, maintenance, warehouse, logistics and commercial teams.Confer with management to establish production KPIs and how they are monitored and reported.Maximize juice, pulp, oil and other valuable product recovery from incoming fruit; investigate losses and process inefficiencies.Reviews and analyzes production, quality control, maintenance, and operational reports to determine causes of nonconformity with product specifications and operating or production problems.Develop and implement operating methods and procedures designed to eliminate operating problems and improve product quality. Ensure these methods are documented and trained as per company standards.Conducts meetings to resolve or effectively reach a settlement of grievances and refers unresolved grievances to the human resources department.Ensure production data is accurately entered into the ERP systems in a timely manner.Lead root-cause analysis and improvement projects; eliminate recurring losses and bottlenecks; promote Lean/CI principles.Partner with maintenance to improve equipment reliability; prioritize critical work; ensure preventive/predictive maintenance is executed; reduce emergency work.Partner with food safety and quality to ensure compliance with internal polices, complete corrective actions in a timely manner, or any other task required to meet GFSI expectations.Lead production; develop supervisors; establish accountability and succession planning.Establish a strong safety culture; ensure OSHA compliance; enforce LOTO, confined space, chemical/ammonia, PPE and other programs; drive incident investigations and corrective actions.Ensure compliance with HACCP/FSMA, sanitation and GMP programs; maintain audit readiness; ensure deviations are properly controlled and documented.Be the subject matter expert for teams for the operations aspect of the business, supporting CAPEX, maintenance and FSQA.Effectively present operations related projects, initiatives, performance results, and other key updates to business leadership and employees.NOTE: The Director of Operations, at any time, depending on the needs of the company, could add other duties.FOOD SAFETY RESPONSIBILITIES:The employee shall be responsible for all reasonable measures and precautions to ensure compliance with 21CFR 117, FSMA, Juice HACCP, GFSI standards and process controls within their department.SUPERVISORY RESPONSIBILITIES:This job has 2 departments reporting to it, juice processing and feedmill. This position schedules all operations supervisory employees’ vacations and work schedules. This position is also required to work out any major employee disputes and perform annual employee evaluations.