Director, Maintenance Reliability & Work Management

Reporting to the Senior Director of Engineering, you will lead the enterprise strategy, standards, capability, and continuous improvement for maintenance work management across Conagra manufacturing sites. You will establish and sustain a consistent operating system for identifying, prioritizing, planning, scheduling, executing, closing, and improving proactive and reactive maintenance work. You will partner with plant leadership, Maintenance, Operations, Engineering, Information Technology, Maintenance, Repair, and Operations, Reliability Engineering, and the Reliability Center of Excellence to improve asset availability, maintenance productivity, schedule predictability, data quality, and sustainable business performance.

A Taste of Your Responsibilities

• Lead the enterprise Maintenance Work Management strategy, establishing the vision, standards, implementation roadmap, role clarity, and governance model that support sustained business performance.
• Influence senior leaders and cross-functional partners to advance proactive and reactive maintenance practices and drive the organizational, process, system, and behavioral changes required for enterprise adoption and accountability.
• Establish the enterprise operating framework for work identification and control, prioritization, job planning, materials readiness, scheduling, execution, closeout, backlog management, shutdown coordination, and continuous improvement.
• Guide network-wide implementation and sustainment by aligning plant and corporate leaders on maturity priorities, improvement roadmaps, adoption expectations, and performance outcomes.
• Establish enterprise requirements and decision rights across the work-order lifecycle, from request and prioritization through planning, execution, feedback, completion, and closure.
• Shape enterprise job-planning expectations that improve safety, labor productivity, materials readiness, execution quality, equipment documentation, and post-job learning.
• Drive scheduling and backlog governance across the manufacturing network to improve capacity visibility, schedule compliance, shutdown readiness, and prioritization of critical work.
• Direct the enterprise business strategy and requirements for Systems, Applications, and Products Plant Maintenance and related digital capabilities, partnering with Information Technology, functional teams, data governance, and site stakeholders to prioritize and sustain high-value functionality, reporting, workflows, and enhancements.
• Provide governance for equipment master data, functional-location structures, bills of material, task lists, maintenance plans, work centers, statuses, coding, and related records to support effective execution and enterprise insight.
• Define the enterprise performance-management approach for work management, using key performance indicators and insights to influence priorities, direct support, assess progress, and inform leadership decisions.
• Establish the enterprise framework for controlled process documentation, standard work, training materials, system-utilization standards, and implementation playbooks.
• Build organizational capability and a sustainable talent pipeline through role-based development, leadership forums, cross-site communities of practice, coaching, and targeted technical support.
• Lead enterprise change strategy for major deployments by aligning stakeholders, communications, capability building, adoption measures, and sustainment routines.
• Influence Engineering and project leaders to embed maintenance and reliability requirements into capital planning and help ensure new and modified assets transition with complete strategies, data, documentation, training, and planned-work requirements.
• Align work management strategy with Maintenance, Repair, and Operations, reliability engineering, asset care, lubrication, technician capability, safety, quality, and Manufacturing Excellence priorities to maximize enterprise value.
• Lead a portfolio of complex, multi-site initiatives, providing strategic direction and influencing site teams, functional partners, contractors, and consulting resources to deliver measurable business outcomes.
• Promote a culture of safety, inclusion, engagement, accountability, and continuous improvement while modeling Conagra values across the manufacturing network.
• Travel approximately 50% to manufacturing sites, with occasional additional travel based on business and site support needs. Adjust working hours when needed to support plant operations, shutdowns, or implementations.

Ingredients Required for Your Success

• Bachelor's degree in Engineering, Maintenance Reliability, Industrial Technology, Operations Management, or a related technical field, or an associate's degree with equivalent relevant experience.
• 10 or more years of maintenance, reliability, engineering, or manufacturing experience, including leadership responsibility for maintenance planning, scheduling, work management, or asset reliability programs.
• Progressive maintenance and reliability experience in a manufacturing environment, including maintenance planning, scheduling, supervision, or management.
• Demonstrated success leading maintenance, reliability, and work management programs in manufacturing, industrial, or consumer packaged goods environments, including implementing and sustaining enterprise standards and best practices across multiple manufacturing sites.
• Expert knowledge of maintenance work management, including work identification, prioritization, planning, scheduling, execution, closeout, backlog management, shutdowns, preventive maintenance, and continuous improvement.
• Strong working knowledge of Systems, Applications, and Products Plant Maintenance or a comparable enterprise asset management system. Advanced experience with master data, bills of material, task lists, maintenance plans, materials, scheduling, statuses, revisions, and deadline monitoring is preferred.
• Experience with equipment master data, Maintenance, Repair, and Operations materials management, project-to-maintenance turnover, key performance indicator definition, performance analysis, and practical improvement planning.
• Experience developing technical documentation and training, coaching plant teams, and leading organizational change.
• Advanced Excel and data-analysis skills. Experience with Power BI, SharePoint, Teams, and PowerPoint is preferred.
• Experience in food, consumer packaged goods, process, or high-speed packaging manufacturing is preferred.
• Certified Maintenance and Reliability Professional, Certified Maintenance and Reliability Technician, Project Management Professional, Lean Six Sigma, or comparable professional certification is preferred.
• Experience influencing across functions and organizational levels, managing competing priorities, and leading complex initiatives without relying solely on direct authority.
• Strong written, verbal, facilitation, stakeholder-management, and executive-communication skills.
• Collaborative, customer-focused leadership style with strong problem-solving skills and credibility from the plant floor through senior leadership.

Physical Requirements

More information about essential tasks and the facility will be shared during the hiring process. This role may require you to be in our manufacturing facilities. When visiting these sites, the physical requirements below may apply:

• You may be required to walk around the facility, climb stairs/ladders, kneel, or perform repetitive tasks that require hand-eye coordination.
• You may be required to lift or carry materials that can vary in weight and size.
• This is a manufacturing environment with large, moving equipment. Noise levels can be high, and temperatures may vary.

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Compensation 

The annual salary listed above is the expected offering for this position. An employee’s actual annual salary will be based on but not limited to: location, relevant experience/level and skillset, while balancing internal Conagra employees’ equity. Conagra Brands will comply with applicable law regarding minimum salaries for exempt employees.

Anticipated Close Date 

Our Benefits

We care about your total well-being and will support you with the following, subject to your location and role:

• Health: Comprehensive healthcare plans, wellness incentive program, mental wellbeing support and fitness reimbursement

• Wealth: Great pay, bonus incentive opportunity, matching 401(k) and stock purchase plan

• Growth: Career development opportunities, employee resource groups, on-demand learning and tuition reimbursement

• Balance: Paid-time off, parental leave, flexible work-schedules (subject to your location and role) and volunteer opportunities

Our Company

At Conagra Brands, we have a rich heritage of making great food. We aspire to have the most impactful, energized and inclusive culture in food. As a member of our 18,000+ person team across 40+ locations, you are empowered to reach your potential, make an impact and own your career. We're in the business of building champions – within our people and our iconic brands like Birds Eye®, Slim Jim® and Reddi-Wip®.

Our focus on innovation extends beyond making great food, it also reflects our commitment to embracing new solutions that positively impact our team, the communities we serve and the health of our planet. Foodies Welcome.

Conagra Brands is an equal opportunity employer and considers qualified applicants for employment without regard to sex, race, color, religion, ethnic or national origin, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, pregnancy, leave status, disability, veteran status, genetic information and/or any other characteristic or status protected by national, federal, state or local law. Reasonable accommodation may be made upon request.