Director of Manufacturing

Equipment Manufacturing | Peoria, IL (In-Person) | Full-Time | Relocation Assistance Provided Compensation: $150,000 – $190,000 Reports To: Chief Operating Officer (COO) Someone has to own what happens on the shop floor — the safety, the quality, the schedule, and the people who make it all happen. If leading that operation, at scale, is the challenge you want, keep reading. Rheo Engineering designs and builds engineer-to-order and standardized process equipment for the pharmaceutical industry — equipment used in the direct manufacture of life-saving medicine. Our Equipment division is scaling fast, and our fabrication, assembly, and integration floor needs to scale with it. We're looking for a Director of Manufacturing to own that floor — safety, quality, on-time delivery, and the skilled-trades workforce behind it all — reporting directly to our COO. What You'll Do Supervisory • Lead, develop, and hold accountable shop-floor supervisors, leads, and trades teams — building a strong frontline leadership bench to support scaling • Coach teams in structured problem-solving and lean methods (e.g., 5S, kaizen) to eliminate waste and improve flow • Foster a culture of ownership, accountability, and continuous improvement where every team member is empowered to surface problems and improve the process • Partner with HR on hiring, onboarding, training, performance management, and workforce development for a growing trades organization • Lead change management so new processes, layouts, equipment, and systems are adopted effectively and sustainably Non-Supervisory • Champion a zero-injury safety culture on the manufacturing floor — machine guarding, lockout/tagout, ergonomics, hot-work, and PPE compliance • Ensure builds meet engineering specs, drawings, and applicable codes (e.g., ASME BPE), along with the cGMP-aligned documentation and material traceability pharmaceutical customers require, partnering with Quality on first-pass acceptance and audit readiness • Own daily and weekly shop-floor execution — fabrication, assembly, integration, and factory acceptance testing — to hit build milestones, ship dates, and customer witness events • Translate project schedules and engineering releases into production plans and shop loading across concurrent engineer-to-order projects, managing constraints and driving recovery plans when delivery is at risk • Build and execute a manufacturing capacity plan that scales fabrication, assembly, and integration ahead of demand • Lead skilled-trades workforce planning — welders, fabricators, assemblers, and technicians — including hiring, cross-training, certification, and flexible labor strategies to grow capability without diluting quality • Partner with the COO on data-driven capacity and headcount modeling, and identify the capital equipment, tooling, and floor-space investments needed to expand throughput • Define and own manufacturing KPIs — on-time delivery, first-pass yield, labor utilization, safety, and rework — and drive root-cause analysis and corrective action when targets are missed • Manage manufacturing labor cost and utilization against project estimates, protecting Equipment-division margin as volume scales • Partner with Engineering, Project Management, and Supply Chain to keep designs manufacturable, schedules on track, and materials available • Establish standard operating rhythms (daily huddles, tiered production reviews) so execution is consistent and coordinated across the floor • Serve as the manufacturing point of accountability for Quality and customer witness / factory acceptance events What Success Looks Like • The floor runs safely and ships projects on time to specification, with high first-pass yield, minimal rework, and labor utilization and build costs tracking to estimate • Skilled-trades capacity, disciplined standard work, and a frontline leadership bench scale to support backlog and pipeline, with Manufacturing operating as a predictable, collaborative partner Experience What We're Looking For • Bachelor's degree preferred, in engineering, manufacturing, industrial, or operations • 5+ years of progressive manufacturing leadership experience, including direct responsibility for shop-floor operations in an engineer-to-order, custom-equipment, or fabrication and assembly environment • Demonstrated success scaling manufacturing capacity and a skilled-trades workforce to meet growing demand • Track record of delivering complex builds on time, on quality, and on cost in a low-volume, high-mix setting Software • Proficiency in Microsoft Office (Word, Excel, Teams, PowerPoint, Outlook) • Proficiency with ERP software (Epicor Kinetic preferred) • Comfort using production data, dashboards, and reporting tools to manage performance Traits • Operational & Analytical — strong ability to translate data into floor-level decisions and action • Hands-On Leadership — a visible leader who builds trust with frontline teams and drives accountability • Communication & Collaboration — excellent cross-functional partnership across Engineering, Project Management, Quality, and Supply Chain • Disciplined Execution — committed to safety, quality, and standard work, with a continuous-improvement mindset • Comfort with Ambiguity — able to build structure and capacity in a scaling environment while keeping production running Values Alignment • Initiative: instinct for taking action to improve, solve, and deliver. • Collaboration: proactive communication with your stakeholders. • Competence: ability to do your job well. • Reliability: persistent follow-through on commitments. • Bold Humility: courage to speak, act, and listen without arrogance. Preferred Qualifications • Experience in pharmaceutical, biotech, or other regulated process-equipment manufacturing • Familiarity with ASME BPE, cGMP, weld qualification, and material-traceability requirements • Lean / Six Sigma certification (Green Belt or Black Belt) • Experience standing up or expanding manufacturing capacity, shifts, or facilities during rapid growth Why Rheo • Privately owned and operated for 30 years and counting • Excellent benefits — see section below • Smaller team (~100 team members) with a strong, in-person work culture • Own the shop floor for a growing pharmaceutical equipment manufacturer — direct influence over the safe, reliable, and efficient production of medicine throughout the world • Real ownership — build the manufacturing organization, capacity, and leadership bench as the division scales • Vertically integrated — have direct, in-person access to the engineering team behind the designs your team builds • A growing company in a stable, regulated industry where precision manufacturing matters Benefits • Leading medical insurance — consistently low rates compared to other businesses in the area • Health Savings Account with employer contributions (plan-dependent) • Dental, vision, and life insurance • Short-term and long-term disability • Identity theft insurance • 401(k) with 4% employer match • Generous PTO • Paid paternity and maternity leave • Paid cell phone plan with stipend for a new phone every 2 years • Employee referral program Working Conditions This role includes regular time on the manufacturing floor, with exposure to fabrication, welding, and assembly environments and associated PPE requirements, along with periods at a desk for planning, analysis, and reporting. Standard business hours apply, with flexibility required to support production needs, critical project milestones, customer commitments, and peak workload periods. Travel is minimal, under 5% of the time, primarily to visit customer sites, suppliers, and partners. Rheo Engineering provides reasonable accommodations to enable qualified individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions of this role, except where doing so would impose an undue hardship. Rheo Engineering is an equal opportunity employer.