Sr. Manager, Continuous Improvement

  Title:  Sr. Manager, Continuous Improvement

Reports to: Director Plant Operations

Location: Holland, MI

LG Energy Solution Michigan Inc. (LGESMI) develops and manufactures large lithium ion polymer batteries and packs for electric vehicle (EV) and energy storage applications. Come join the leader in advanced EV batteries!

Summary:

As the Senior Manager, you will own LGESMI’s enterprise transformation strategy across operations, digital systems, quality, and culture. This role leads plant-wide compliance, diagnostics, and performance governance while enabling a data-driven, Industry 4.0 manufacturing environment. You will serve as the executive owner of Layered Process Audits (LPA), compliance analytics, production process governance, and North America certification programs, partnering directly with plant leadership and global HQ.

Responsibilities:

• 
  
• Own plant-wide LPA diagnostics and executive reporting across all production areas.
  
• Lead DL-level LPA analysis, root cause trending, and improvement management.
  
• Establish governance models to track risk, compliance gaps, and corrective actions.
  
• Develop executive dashboards and reporting standards for compliance and performance.
  
• Serve as enterprise owner of production process compliance promotion and audit readiness
  
• Drive standardization of audit methodology, corrective action tracking, and escalation models.
  
• Partner with Quality, Operations, and Safety to ensure regulatory and internal compliance.
  
• Lead the North America data-driven training & certification program for LPA, Lean, Digital, and compliance excellence.
  
• Design certification frameworks, competency models, dashboards, and validation systems.
  
• Ensure skills adoption is measured, sustained, and tied to operational performance.
  
• Own the enterprise innovation and transformation roadmap aligned to LG global strategy.
  
• Define multi-year business transformation initiatives, KPIs, and milestone roadmaps.
  
• Serve as trusted advisor to Directors, Executives, and HQ leadership.
  
• Govern large-scale cross-plant initiatives (battery manufacturing, automation, smart factory, digitalization).
  
• Prioritize programs based on ROI, compliance risk, and operational impact.
  
• Lead managers, project leaders, and technical teams.
  
• Build a plant-wide continuous improvement and compliance culture.
  
• Drive Industry 4.0 systems (IIoT, AI, Digital Twin, BI, Cloud).
  
• Translate data into predictive insights and business performance improvements.
  
• Deliver dashboards, business cases, compliance metrics, and performance analytics to leadership.
  
• Promote 5S3R, layered audits, standard work, and governance best practices.
  
• Maintain cleanliness at work-site in accordance with 5S3R Standards:
  
• Sort, Set in order, Shine, Standardize, Sustain
  
• Right Location, Right Quantity, Right Container
  

Qualifications:

• 
  
• Bachelor’s degree required, MBA or MS preferred, or equivalent, relevant experience
  
• PMP certification or equivalent is preferred
  
• Lean Six Sigma Black Belt Certification Preferred
  

Experience:

• 
  
• 10+ years of experience in an automotive or other manufacturing environment
  
• 7+ years of experience leading and managing multiple processes
  
• Experience with Industry 4.0 technologies (IIoT, Digital Twin, Cloud Computing, Big Data, AI, Edge Computing, etc.) preferred
  
• Experience in leading culture shifts towards innovation is desired
  

Skills:

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• Comfort around higher management
  
• Ability to deal with ambiguity and make sound decisions
  
• Effective workflow and process management
  
• Planning skills and effective communication of priorities
  
• Delegation and directing teams to meet goals
  
• Understanding of management engineering as it impacts manufacturing quality, outcomes, financial performance, and long-term planning in terms of business transformation
  
• Proven data-backed problem solving and business intelligence reporting skills
  
• Ability to work flexible hours as needed to support entire production team
  
• Ability to work flexible hours as needed to support and work with HQ and global sites