Mgr, Operational Excellence

 Work Location Type: Hybrid 

As a leading industrial distributor with operations primarily in North America, Japan and the United Kingdom, We Keep The World Working® by serving more than 4.5 million customers worldwide with products delivered through innovative technology and deep customer relationships. With 2023 sales of $16.5 billion, we’re dedicated to providing value for customers, fostering an engaging culture for team members and driving strong financial results.

Our welcoming workplace enables you to learn, grow and make a difference by keeping businesses running and their people safe. As a 2024 Glassdoor Best Place to Work and a Great Place to Work-Certified™ company, we’re looking for passionate people to join our team as we continue leading the industry over our next 100 years.

Position Details:

The Operational Excellence (OE) team ensures Grainger’s Merchandising and Supplier Management department (MSM) understands how value is created for our customers through our operations and is seeking to persistently increase that value while eliminating waste. 

As Manager, Operational Excellence, you will oversee a team and lead strategic initiatives and software implementations to transform MSM’s operating models to enhance how teams deliver value and oversee continuous improvements to the existing operating models. You will report to the Sr Manager, MSM Implementations.

Opportunity to work hybrid 3 days per week in the office from either our Lake Forest, IL office or downtown Chicago office at the Merchandise Mart.

You Will:

• Coach team members who are accountable for defining, planning, orchestrating, and delivering continuous improvements to the existing model that increase value or eliminate waste.
• Promote team effectiveness by utilizing each person’s unique talent and skills, motivates performance, fosters communication, provides coaching, and mitigates problems.
• Drive Robotic Process Automation (RPA) initiative forward by implementing robust training and communication plan for new RPA offering; identify biggest opportunities for productivity savings and supports OE Lead to execute deployment and maintenance of automation work across the organization.   
• Lead the effort to standardize and track productivity savings across MSM Enablement in partnership with MSM Finance to gain sign-off for cost savings or value creation.
• Drive thought leadership and problem solving: Support leaders and stakeholders in defining and reaching their vision.
• Outline and operationalizes models (process, tools, and governance) rooted in continuous improvement principles.
• Institute project management best practices across the team to manage scope, planning, deployment, communication, training, and change management. 
• Ensure that milestones are identified and tracked to identify and resolve issues and mitigate risks that may threaten delivery.
• Prioritize work, drives progress, remove barriers, and communicate status to leaders and partners.
• Influence business outcomes & delivers sustained results through others.

You Have:

• Bachelor's degree or equivalent
• 5+ years of experience in related field
• Demonstrated leadership ability to quickly earn trust; mobilize and motivate teams; set direction and approach; resolve conflict; deliver tough messages with grace; execute with limited information and ambiguity.
• Demonstrated, applied expertise organizing and delivering complex initiatives.
• Experience fostering thought leadership and exploration: the ability to tease out requirements, get to the root of the customer problem, and displays end-to-end thinking.
• Accomplished in and fosters the use of Continuous Improvement (CI) methods and tools to transform operations. 
• Core project management knowledge and skills and expertise with different project development lifecycle methods, such as Agile/Scrum and Waterfall

Rewards and Benefits:

With benefits starting day one, our programs provide choice and flexibility to meet team members' individual needs. Check out the highlights below and review all our benefits at GraingerTotalRewards.com.

• Medical, dental, vision, life, and pet insurance plans and 6 free sessions each year with a licensed therapist to support your emotional wellbeing
• Paid time off (PTO) and 6 company holidays per year
• 6% company contribution to a 401(k) Retirement Savings Plan each pay period, no match required
• Employee discounts, tuition reimbursement, student loan refinancing and free access to financial counseling, education and tools
• Maternity support programs, nursing benefits, and up to 14 weeks paid leave for birth parents and up to 4 weeks paid leave for non-birth parents

We are committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, color, ancestry, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, age, citizenship, marital status, disability, gender, gender identity or expression, or veteran status. We are proud to be an equal opportunity workplace.

We are committed to fostering an inclusive, accessible environment that includes both providing reasonable accommodations to individuals with disabilities during the application and hiring process as well as throughout the course of one’s employment.  With this in mind, should you need a reasonable accommodation during the application and selection process, please advise us so that we can provide appropriate assistance.

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