Operations Manager

OPERATIONS MANAGER

Rochester, New York | On-site | $125,000 - $150,000 + bonus

StraussGroup Executive Search is conducting an exclusive search for an Operations Manager on behalf of an established steel service center east of Rochester. We will share the full company story with candidates in our first conversation.

ABOUT THE ROLE

This is a newly created position at a 40,000 square foot facility running custom, made-to-order work at a fast pace: 50 to 80 new orders a day with only 24 to 48 hours of visibility into what is coming next.

About 80 percent of this job is lived inside the ERP system. You are ordering raw material against forecasted demand, matching it to capacity, keeping orders moving, and closing them out correctly so inventory and billing stay accurate. The rest is leading the floor and being the decision maker on site, including standing in front of a customer when they come in to audit quality.

This is not a sales or quoting seat. The job is running what is already there, and running it better than it has been run. The role reports to the President and has nine to ten people rolling up to it: saw operators, drivers, an on-site supervisor, and office order entry staff.

WHAT YOU WILL BE DOING

• Own production and materials planning: forecast demand, order raw material, match it against capacity, and protect on-time delivery
• Live in the business system daily and keep the data clean, from part setup and units of measure through order close, inventory accuracy, and billing
• Spot demand trends the system does not flag on its own, then pick up the phone and verify them with the customer before they become a shortage
• Lead the on-site team day to day, including the floor supervisor and the order entry group
• Represent the company on quality process and customer audits
• Be the person on site who can make a decision without waiting for corporate

WHAT WE ARE LOOKING FOR

• A manufacturing background where you owned planning, scheduling, or materials, not just executed someone else's plan
• Real fluency in an ERP system: parts, dimensions, units of measure, and the conversion from raw material to finished goods
• Experience leading a small team in a production environment
• Comfort with quality standards and the confidence to represent the company when a customer audits you
• Sound judgment under short lead times, and the instinct to act on a trend before it becomes a problem
• Someone who moves work forward without being checked on

NICE TO HAVE

• Steel, metals, or another service center environment
• Epicor experience
• Exposure to customer audits, whether hosting them or participating
• Custom or made-to-order production rather than long standardized runs

WHY THIS ONE IS WORTH A LOOK

• A newly created seat with genuine ownership of a single site, not a layer inside a large org chart
• Direct line to the President, with corporate resources behind you
• A stable, long-running customer base and a facility built for the work it does
• Real autonomy: you set how this location runs

Base salary is $125,000 to $150,000 depending on depth of experience, plus bonus and a full benefits package. This position is on-site in Farmington and is commutable from Rochester, Victor, Canandaigua, Fairport, Webster, Geneva, and the surrounding area.

One note on titles: this work shows up under a lot of different names. Operations Manager, Materials Manager, Supply Chain Manager, Production Planner, Plant Supervisor. If the description above is what you actually do, the title on your resume matters less than the scope.

All applications and conversations for this search go through StraussGroup and are handled confidentially. If this sounds like your kind of work, apply here or reach out directly.