Position Summary
Collaborative Strategies, Inc. is conducting this search on behalf of TriRinse, a 2nd generation family-owned agricultural and chemical container solutions expert. TriRinse is seeking a Chief Operations Officer to strengthen planning, improve execution, and build long-term leadership capability across their four distinct business units. The COO will lead business unit and site leaders to set clear expectations for safety, quality, and customer commitments — and to support their teams in consistently meeting them.
This role balances near-term execution with long-term capability building, strengthening leadership effectiveness, operational discipline, and scalable systems so TriRinse can manage seasonality, optimize labor, and run the business well for the long term.
Reporting to the CEO, the COO will:
- Build Strong, Accountable Leaders
- Lead Business Unit and Site Leaders with clear expectations and accountability for results.
- Set priorities across business units so leaders are focused on the right work at the right time.
- Set clear expectations for effective planning, sound decision-making, and follow-through — and ensure leaders own the outcomes.
- Address performance gaps directly and fairly, reinforcing TRI values and leadership expectations.
- Own Operational Performance
- Own enterprise operational performance, including safety, quality, customer commitments, labor utilization, and cost discipline.
- Ensure work is sequenced and resourced to set teams up for success.
- Anticipate risks, adjust plans proactively, and balance short-term needs with long-term business health.
- Ensure operational execution consistently strengthens long-term customer trust.
- Strengthen Planning and Operating Discipline
- Build planning practices that align demand, labor, capacity, and equipment across business units.
- Establish a clear operating rhythm, including business reviews and performance discussions.
- Define a small set of meaningful KPIs tied to safety, quality, customer commitments, labor efficiency, and cost, and ensure leaders use them to guide decisions.
- Drive disciplined follow-through and timely escalation when plans are off track.
- Reinforce Safety, Quality and Reliability
- Partner with the Chief People Officer and Safety leadership to reinforce a strong, lived culture of safety.
- Ensure leaders model clear expectations for safe work practices.
- Strengthen quality and reliability to reduce rework, errors, and customer disruption.
- Promote learning and problem-solving rather than blame or workarounds.
- Optimize Workforce and Labor Strategy
- Own workforce and labor strategy, including staffing models, cross-training, and deployment.
- Align labor decisions to seasonality, business fluctuations, and shared workforce environments.
- Balance productivity, cost, and engagement in partnership with People and Finance.
- Build Leadership Capability and Continuous Improvement
- Clarify expectations for how leaders plan, prioritize, communicate, and execute.
- Reinforce leader standard work and coaching habits.
- Champion continuous improvement as a leader-led discipline focused on outcomes.
- Lead change thoughtfully, avoiding initiative overload and maintaining trust.
Qualifications
- Bachelor’s degree required; advanced degree preferred.
- 10+ years of senior operations leadership experience in multi-site or multi-business environments.
- Proven experience leading leaders with accountability for safety, quality, labor, cost, and customer commitments.
- Demonstrated ability to build strong leadership teams, develop talent, and strengthen bench over time.
- Strong business judgment and understanding of financials, cost structures, planning, and operational tradeoffs.
- Experience strengthening planning and execution disciplines in environments with variability, seasonality, or shared resources.
- Practical experience applying continuous improvement and change leadership to drive better outcomes.
- Clear, direct communicator comfortable with difficult conversations and decision-making.
- Highly collaborative partner who builds trust and alignment across functions.
- Acts with integrity and consistency, modeling company values and following through on commitments.
- Willingness to travel at least 20%.
Skills Required
- Bachelor's degree required; advanced degree preferred.
- 10+ years of senior operations leadership experience in multi-site or multi-business environments.
- Proven experience leading leaders with accountability for safety, quality, labor, cost, and customer commitments.
- Demonstrated ability to build strong leadership teams, develop talent, and strengthen bench over time.
- Strong business judgment and understanding of financials, cost structures, planning, and operational tradeoffs.
- Experience strengthening planning and execution disciplines in environments with variability, seasonality, or shared resources.
- Practical experience applying continuous improvement and change leadership to drive better outcomes.
- Clear, direct communicator comfortable with difficult conversations and decision-making.
- Highly collaborative partner who builds trust and alignment across functions.
- Acts with integrity and consistency, modeling company values and following through on commitments.
- Willingness to travel at least 20%.
What We Do
Collaborative Strategies is our region’s leading strategic business planning firm – providing strategic planning, executive search, organizational development, succession management, and advisory board facilitation to the best organizations in the St. Louis area and beyond. Collaborative Strategies is an entrepreneurial firm serving entrepreneurial leaders. Our team of consultants primarily assist closely-held businesses with annual sales ranging from $5 million to $1 billion as well as the not-for-profit organizations on whose boards business owners and civic leaders serve. Collaborative Strategies helps its clients tackle challenging issues and opportunities to achieve breakthrough performance. Collaborative Strategies’ consulting team members fully embody the collaborative spirit. Prepared by education and enriched by experience, our principals and consultants combine deep knowledge with practical expertise gained across a wide spectrum of organizations. For more information, please visit us at www.getcollaborative.com.
