What are the responsibilities and job description for the VITAL Continuous Improvement Manager position at Barnes Group?
Key Responsibilities
- Business Partnership & Strategy
- Act as a strategic business partner to site leadership to identify opportunities for operational and financial performance improvement.
- Analyze current processes, workflows, and systems to identify inefficiencies and develop improvement strategies that drive measurable results.
- Operational Excellence & VITAL Ownership
- Lead the deployment, sustainment, and continuous evolution of the VITAL Operating System at the site.
- Ensure alignment with enterprise CI standards, tools, and methodologies through close collaboration with the Director of Continuous Improvement.
- Project Leadership & Execution
- Identify, prioritize, and lead high-impact CI projects and initiatives that deliver quality, operational, financial, and customer satisfaction improvements.
- Drive successful execution of projects from concept through implementation and sustainment.
- Frameworks & Capability Building
- Establish and deploy structured CI frameworks, governance, and standard work across the organization.
- Build organizational capability by training, coaching, developing and mentoring employees at all levels in CI methodologies and tools.
- Cross-Functional Collaboration
- Partner with operations, engineering, quality, supply chain, finance, safety and other functions to enhance productivity and drive cross-functional improvements.
- Facilitate workshops, kaizen events, training and problem-solving sessions.
- Performance & Analytics
- Utilize data-driven methodologies to identify root causes, track performance, and validate improvement outcomes.
- Develop and maintain key performance indicators (KPIs) to measure CI effectiveness.
- Continuous Learning & Best Practices
- Stay current with industry trends, tools, and best practices in continuous improvement and operational excellence.
- Drive standardization and sharing of best practices across the organization.
Qualifications
- Minimum of 5-7 years of experience delivering measurable, step-change improvements in business or operational performance.
- Proven hands-on experience with continuous improvement tools and methodologies (e.g., Lean, Theory of Constraints, Kaizen), with relevant certifications preferred.
- Demonstrated ability to lead and influence across multiple levels of the organization.
- Strong understanding of operational excellence principles across manufacturing or industrial environments.
- Analytical, data-driven approach to problem solving with strong attention to detail.
- Excellent communication, facilitation, and interpersonal skills.
- Strong numerical and analytical capability.
- Project Management certification preferred, but not required, or a strong project management background.
- Six Sigma certification (Green Belt or Black Belt) is a plus.
Education Requirements
- Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration, Engineering, Operations, Supply Chain, or a related technical discipline preferred.