Manager, Testing & Lab Operations

Opportunity: Compliance Testing & Lab Operations Manager (Cannabis / Regulated Manufacturing)

Location📍: Cortland, NY

Salary💰: $65,000–$75,000 (flexible above this range for right candidate)

Full-Time - Will relocated for right candidate.

A rapidly growing, mission-driven organization in the regulated cannabis manufacturing space is seeking a Compliance Testing & Lab Operations Manager to own and optimize its third-party testing ecosystem.

This role is central to ensuring product compliance, production scalability, and operational efficiency across all finished goods testing. You will act as the cross-functional lead between Production, Quality, R&D, Supply Chain, and external laboratories, ensuring testing throughput supports business growth without compromising regulatory integrity.

About the Role

This is a high-impact operational role responsible for the strategy, performance, and continuous improvement of all compliance testing activities.

You will not be performing day-to-day sampling or paperwork execution—instead, you will oversee the system, manage vendor relationships, analyze performance data, and drive improvements across the entire testing lifecycle.

This role is critical to:

• Preventing production delays caused by lab bottlenecks
• Ensuring regulatory compliance and audit readiness
• Improving turnaround times and testing efficiency
• Protecting revenue through proactive risk and failure management

Key Responsibilities

Testing Operations & Strategy

• Own end-to-end compliance testing workflow for finished goods
• Forecast testing volume aligned with production planning
• Identify and resolve bottlenecks impacting turnaround time
• Develop proactive testing schedules to support scale

Laboratory & Vendor Management

• Manage relationships with third-party testing laboratories
• Negotiate pricing, service levels, and contracts
• Monitor lab performance and resolve discrepancies
• Ensure priority service during peak production periods

Data & Performance Management

• Track and analyze testing data (TAT, failure rates, variance, etc.)
• Build reporting dashboards for leadership visibility
• Identify systemic risks and quality trends
• Support financial insights tied to yield and potency

Failure Management & Remediation

• Own testing failure tracking and resolution workflows
• Coordinate cross-functional corrective actions
• Lead root cause analysis and prevention strategies
• Maintain audit-ready documentation

Cross-Functional Leadership

• Serve as the central point of coordination across departments
• Align testing timelines with production and product launches
• Ensure compliance is embedded into new product development

Process Improvement

• Develop and maintain SOPs for testing operations
• Standardize workflows with internal testing staff
• Continuously improve efficiency, escalation, and communication systems

What We’re Looking For

• 5 years in regulated manufacturing (Cannabis, Pharma, Food, CPG, or similar)
• Experience managing third-party lab relationships
• Strong data analysis and reporting capability
• Vendor negotiation and contract experience
• Project management across cross-functional teams
• Understanding of regulatory compliance frameworks (GMP preferred)
• Ability to interpret and challenge technical lab data
• Strong communication and organizational skills

Preferred Experience

• Cannabis industry compliance or testing experience
• ERP systems (Acumatica or similar)
• Root cause analysis / CAPA workflows
• Bachelor’s degree in a scientific, technical, or business field

About Vangst

Vangst is the cannabis industry's hiring platform. Vangst helps cannabis companies find the talent they need to grow their business. From on-demand gig workers to trained & credential full-time employees, Vangst has built the industry's go-to talent marketplace for all cannabis hiring. Vangst is proud to work with 1,200 of the cannabis industry's leading businesses.

Since raising their seed round in 2018, Vangst has become one of the fastest-growing companies in the cannabis industry and was recognized as one of Fast Company's Most Innovative Companies.

Today, over 300,000 people have full-time jobs in the cannabis industry and this number is expected to triple over the next five years. Vangst is on a mission to fill every job in the cannabis industry.

Vangst's headquarters is in Denver, CO. Vangst is a Series B company backed by Lerer Hippeau, Colle Capital, Level One Fund, Snoop Dogg's Casa Verde Capital, and others.

Vangst provides equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type without regard to race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local laws.

This policy applies to all terms and conditions of employment, including recruiting, hiring, placement, promotion, termination, layoff, recall, transfer, leaves of absence, compensation, and training.