SAP Plant Operations Lead

Morton Salt is an iconic company with a strong heritage and a bright future. Since 1848, we have been improving lives and enhancing everyday moments – at home, at work, and virtually everywhere in between. We help unlock the flavors in food, make roads and sidewalks safer, improve the water in baths, pools, and homes, and keep businesses and industries running. We are a dedicated team who constantly strives to do better together, and we are passionate about building a sustainable future for our company, the communities in which we operate, and the world around us. By joining our team, you will contribute to producing and delivering every form of salt that enhances everyday life.

Job Summary

The SAP Plant Operations Lead is responsible for the integration, development, and delivery of technical solutions deployed in the global production environment. This role provides day-to-day configuration and process support for applications that enable critical operating functions. The SAP Plant Operations Lead collaborates closely with business partners, from Directors to individual department employees, to structure business requirements and design IT solutions. This requires an understanding of numerous end-to-end business processes in manufacturing, warehousing, and shipping operations, and in-depth knowledge of how these processes are implemented in IT solutions. The Lead provides hands-on guidance on system design and project management to ensure projects are delivered on time and within budget to direct and distributed teams.

The SAP Plant Operations Lead is solely responsible for ensuring the operation and improvement of IT Applications supporting business processes related to Plant Maintenance, Manufacturing, Quality, Environmental Health and Safety, Package Shipping, Bulk Shipping (Pacweigh/JWS), and Warehouse Management.

This position requires an innovative individual who can mobilize distributed teams within a multinational company to execute technology solutions and business processes in alignment with the business vision. The Lead works with peers and external partners to improve existing systems and provide new solutions to support the business strategy, as well as envision and prepare for the future. The ideal candidate will have a proven track record of innovation, effective execution, business process improvement, solution ownership, and productive partnership.

The business will consider the SAP Plant Operations Lead to be their business and systems expert, and their key technology partner in executing projects and system sustainment towards increased efficiency and revenue generation.

This role can be performed at any Morton Salt plant location.

Duties and Responsibilities

• Ensure IT applications are available and operating on a day-to-day basis.
• Respond to and provide timely resolution of any problems with IT applications that impact our ability to manufacture, store, or ship products.
• Lead the implementation and integration of SAP systems within our plant operations, ensuring that business processes are effectively supported and streamlined.
• Work with Managers, Business, and Process Leads to identify and prioritize issues, improvements, and projects.
• Provide project management that effectively manages multiple tasks and resources (employees and vendors), while meeting project timelines, goals, and staying within budget.
• Ensure team members and vendors utilize approved maintenance and support processes.
• Provide leadership in collaboration with members of other functional teams.
• Work closely with other team members, locally and globally, with proactive sharing of expertise to improve and ensure team success.
• Participate fully in the success of the overall global IT team.
• Develop and maintain comprehensive documentation of SAP configurations, processes, and procedures related to plant operations.
• Work with software vendors to develop solutions in response to system malfunctions, software bugs, and program changes.

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities

• Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, or related field, preferred.
• Ability to communicate effectively both orally and in writing.
• Strong problem-solving, troubleshooting, and analytical skills.
• Ability to handle multiple conflicting priorities in a professional manner; good planning and organizing skills.
• Ability to effectively articulate and present complex concepts and ideas to IT development teams.
• Ability to interact with business users and trading partners.
• Experience working in distributed team environments; self-motivated and self-directed.

Required:

• 10+ years of IT industry work experience, including business systems analysis, solution design, application development, and deployment of major Enterprise solutions.
• Delivery experience of Business Applications.
• Solid understanding of business processes, including but not limited to Plant Maintenance, Manufacturing, Quality, Environmental Health and Safety, Package Shipping, Bulk Shipping, and Warehouse Management.
• Team building capabilities, negotiation skills, and capacity to drive win-win outcomes.
• Experience working in a distributed, team-oriented, collaborative environment.
• Demonstrated experience with large Enterprise ERP implementations in the areas of technical design specification, development, and knowledge transfer.
• Experience in SAP functionality in a wide range of areas, specifically PP, PM, QM, EH&S, ITS Mobile, MM. 5 years and 2 full life cycle implementations desired.
• Experience deploying, supporting, and enhancing applications related to bulk shipping, specifically Pacweigh and/or JWS.
• Experience in Master Data and its role in enabling systems.
• Experience with functional design and configuration of IT Applications.
• Experience with end-user support for SAP and non-SAP systems, providing a high level of customer satisfaction.
• Proficient in project management methodologies, with the ability to lead SAP implementation and optimization projects on time and within budget.
• Experience with: MS Windows, Networking, Serial and TCP/IP Communication protocols, Microsoft Office including Outlook, SQL Server.

Advantageous:

• Spanish and/or French language skills.
• Basic understanding of SAP ECC 6.0 and any of the core modules (FI, SD, HR, LE) and manufacturing and consumer products business processes.
• Experience in ABAP, ABAP OOPS, Smart Forms, SAP Scripts.
• Experience with SAP S/4 HANA Maintenance, Production, and Quality processes.
• Basic understanding of SAP BW system and query design.

At Morton Salt, we work best when we work as a team, when we treat one another with dignity and respect, and value the unique contributions of others. We are committed to equal employment opportunity and prohibit discrimination and harassment based on race, national origin, sex, religion, color, disability, marital status, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, genetic information, citizenship, or any other characteristic protected by law.