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Associate Director of Operational Excellence

United States – RemoteProject ManagementRegular

Job Description

Everyone at Kite is grounded by one common goal – curing cancer. Every single day, we seek to establish a direct line between that purpose and our day-to-day work. Would you like to join us in this mission?

We are seeking a highly motivated leader to join us as an Associate Director of Operation Excellence. This Associate Director will report to the Senior Director of Business Strategy & Operations while our preference is for this position to be based out of our Santa Monica, CA headquarters, this opportunity can be a remotely based position in the contiguous United States for the right candidate.

The Associate Director will be responsible for supporting Kite’s Lean Transformation and will be focused on training development and delivery to the global network. The Incumbent, internally known as the Associate Director of Business Strategy and Operations, is accountable for driving a culture of continuous improvement across Technical Operations  (Tech Ops) by supporting systems and processes that empower employees and hold people managers accountable to also identify and make incremental changes that improve efficiencies throughout the functions and manufacturing facilities.

Significant travel to the sites to review implementation, support projects, coach others, and perform assessments of site maturity will be necessary.

Responsibilities of the Associate Director of Operational Excellence includes:

  • Supports key strategic and tactical plans, key performance metrics, and dashboards to drive Kite’s OE program

  • Supports an Operational Excellence maturity model to be deployed across Technical Operations functions and sites

  • Identifies improvement projects by evaluating the organization for waste and complexity and identifying solutions

  • Understands operational requirements and translates these into actions for quality and process improvement by interacting with employees and other teams

  • Ensures Tech Ops has a pipeline of improvement projects and other initiatives which will ensure meeting all strategic goals and targets

  • Develops the Kite Belt Program inclusive of delivering training and coaching candidates through projects

  • Develops, improves, and delivers training in a variety of continuous improvement culture and tools

  • Provides mentorship to site OE leads, kaizen and six sigma teams focused on rapid improvements as needed.

  • Engages the organization through activities such as poster sessions and other learning sessions

Basic Qualifications:

PhD degree with 2+ years of Strategy and/or Operations experience

OR

MA / MD degree with 8+ years of Strategy and/or Operations experience

OR

BS / BA degree with 10+ years of Strategy and/or Operations experience

OR

High School Degree with 14+ years of Strategy and/or Operations experience

Preferred Qualifications:

  • 10+ years of progressive responsibility within a large complex organization with responsibility for key functional operations such as manufacturing, business administration, sales, support and/or operations; and demonstrated ability to effectively manage medium to large-scale change and improvement initiatives

  • Demonstrated ability to teach Lean Six Sigma Green/Black Belt training

  • Strong people leader with an excellent ability to communicate with all levels within the organization, listening and influencing to lead change throughout an organization

  • Ability to interpret and analyze statistical data and financial reports, understand, and resolve technical difficulties, interface with internal engineering/technical experts and external technical representatives, and manage multiple priorities in a global organization

  • Proven ability execute sizeable projects from vision through implementation in matrixed global organizations

  • Proven track record of utilizing operational excellence, lean, or six sigma tools to improve processes and achieve business results

  • Ability to motivate and coach others under their direct or indirect management

  • Lean Six Sigma Black or Master Black Belt certification strongly preferred

Does this sound like you? If so, please apply today!

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