Sr Director, Operations Strategy

Novolex is a leading manufacturer of food, beverage, and specialty packaging that supports multiple industries including foodservice, restaurant delivery and carryout, food processing, grocery and retail, and industrial sectors. Novolex manufacturing and sourcing expertise spans a diverse range of substrates including resin, paper, molded fiber, aluminum and more. We provide customers a broad array of stock and customized solutions with 120 product categories, 250 brands and over 39,000 SKUs.

The Novolex sustainability vision is built upon three pillars: our products, our operations and our people. Each is critically important to our growth and future as a business. These pillars form the foundation of our company-wide commitment to sustainability, helping us achieve our ambitious goals through our wide-ranging initiatives.

Position Summary  This senior leadership role will build and scale the business capabilities required to translate Operations goals into strategies with clear sustainable execution plans. The Senior Director will partner with functional leaders to define strategies, redesign critical ways of working, and ensure teams have the processes, tools, governance, and skills needed to achieve targeted business outcomes. The role will lead cross-functional capability-building efforts from assessment and design through pilot, deployment, adoption, and continuous improvement.

• Assess business areas, operating models, performance gaps, and capability needs; develop clear strategies and roadmaps that achieve targeted goals.
• Partner with Operations and cross-functional leaders to translate enterprise priorities into sequenced initiatives, milestones, resource requirements, and measurable outcomes.
• Develop executive-ready narratives, presentations, and communication materials that leaders can use to align stakeholders and communicate goals to a range of audiences.
• Facilitate structured decision-making with senior leaders, clarifying strategic choices, tradeoffs, risks, dependencies, and expected business value.
• Create governance and performance-management mechanisms that maintain accountability and enable leaders to monitor progress and adjust course.

• Design practical ways of working that close identified gaps and improve effectiveness, consistency, scalability, and accountability across Operations.
• Lead end-to-end process development, including current-state assessment, future-state design, piloting, refinement, deployment, and sustainment.
• Define operating roles and decision rights through RACIs, governance forums, standard work, controls, escalation paths, and performance measures.
• Develop playbooks, procedures, and training materials; coordinate training and change-management activities to support adoption by impacted teams.
• Partner with process owners to embed new practices into day-to-day operations and establish continuous-improvement routines.
• Manage external partners and advisors, ensuring clear scope, high-quality deliverables, knowledge transfer, and value realization.

• Ensure business processes are supported by the right tools, data, and analytics so work can be performed efficiently, consistently, and with appropriate visibility.
• Translate business and process requirements into clear functional requirements and priorities for reporting, analytics, workflow, and decision-support solutions.
• Partner with Digital, IT, Data & Analytics, Finance, and functional teams to evaluate, develop, test, deploy, and improve enabling tools.
• Establish standards for tool ownership, governance, documentation, user support, adoption, and value realization.
• Sponsor the Analytics Community to share and scale best practices, reusable solutions, common standards, and analytical capability across the organization.

• Build a capability-development roadmap that connects skills, processes, tools, data, and governance to Operations priorities.
• Lead cross-functional teams and external partners through ambiguous, enterprise-level work while maintaining pace, alignment, and accountability.
• Develop internal capability to reduce reliance on external support and create repeatable approaches that can be scaled across businesses and functions.
• Mentor team members and business partners in structured problem solving, process design, analytics, change leadership, and executive communication.
• Define success measures and track adoption, process performance, realized value, and sustainment of implemented capabilities.

• Bachelor’s degree in business, operations, supply chain, engineering, analytics, information systems, or a related field; master’s degree preferred.
• 10+ years of progressive experience in operations strategy, business transformation, process excellence, capability building, management consulting, or a related field, including leadership of complex cross-functional initiatives.
• Experience in manufacturing, supply chain, packaging, or another complex operational environment.
• Expertise in business-process design and improvement, including process mapping, future-state design, RACI development, pilot design, standard work, and playbook creation.
• Experience defining business requirements and partnering with technical teams to implement analytics, reporting, workflow, or decision-support tools.
• Strong change-leadership and stakeholder-management skills, with the ability to influence senior leaders and drive adoption across functions without relying solely on direct authority.
• Excellent executive communication skills, including the ability to synthesize complex information into concise, compelling recommendations and leadership materials.
• Strong analytical and financial acumen, with the ability to define value cases, success measures, and performance-management approaches.
• Experience leading teams, developing talent, and managing external partners in a complex, multi-site organization.
• Ability to operate effectively in ambiguity, balance strategy with hands-on execution, and manage multiple enterprise priorities.

A reasonable estimate of the current range is $200-280K + bonus + benefits. The range displayed on each job posting reflects the minimum and maximum target salaries for the position across all US locations. Within the range, individual pay is determined by job-related skills, experience, and relevant education or training. At Novolex, it is not typical for an individual to be hired at the top of the range for their role and compensation decisions are dependent on the facts and circumstances of each case.

The benefits for this role include 401(k) plan with company match, comprehensive medical, dental, and vision insurance, flexible spending and health savings accounts, paid vacation and sick days, paid parental leave, paid holidays and wellness program.

#LI-Remote

#LI-TM1

With safety as our top priority and a commitment to employee well-being an important focus, we offer comprehensive and competitive benefits that include medical, dental and vision insurance as well as a variety of other well-being resources focused on mental, physical and financial health. Specific benefits and well-being programs may vary depending on where you work.

At Novolex, giving back to the local communities that support us is important. Our Focused Giving Program prioritizes support for organizations whose missions promote sustainability initiatives or address food and hunger needs. We also encourage facility level support of activities in the communities where our employees live and work.

We offer constant opportunities for advancement. From skills development to advanced education programs, training and development programs and courses are available through MyLearning. Programs include company and industry training curricula, support for formal education through the Tuition Reimbursement Program (Non-Union), and a Learning Management System that supports and enhances employee skills at all levels of the organization.

Novolex is committed to providing equal employment opportunity in all employment practices, including but not limited to selection, hiring, promotion, transfer, and compensation to all qualified applicants and employees without regard to age, race, color, national origin, sex, pregnancy, sexual orientation, gender identity, religion, handicap or disability, genetics, citizenship status, service member or veteran status, or any other category protected by federal, state, or local law. Any individual who, because of his or her disability, needs an accommodation in connection with an aspect of the Company's application process should contact [email protected].

Formerly Pactiv Evergreen