Chief Operating Officer Manufacturing Jobs in Kansas

Exapta Solutions serves farmers through specialized agricultural equipment, parts, inspections, modifications, and technical expertise.

We help farmers improve profitability, soil health, and long-term sustainability through practical, field-tested solutions. Our customers rely on us for product knowledge, responsiveness, and dependable follow-through.

Exapta is growing and needs a strong operational leader who understands agriculture, equipment, parts, warehouse flow, inventory, vendors, customer urgency, and the financial discipline required to run a product-based business well.

Exapta is hiring a Chief Operating Officer to help lead the business through its next stage of growth.

The COO will serve as a trusted partner to the CEO and work closely with the General Manager, Director of R&D, sales leadership, warehouse team, vendors, suppliers, external production partners, and financial partners.

The Role

This role is designed to strengthen the current leadership team, not work around it. The COO will help create alignment, clarify ownership, improve communication, and make sure company priorities move forward across departments.

The right person will bring senior operational leadership experience in agriculture, farm equipment, equipment parts, manufacturing, warehouse operations, distribution, fulfillment, or another physical product business.

This role requires someone who can lead at the executive level while staying close enough to the work to understand order flow, inventory, purchasing, vendor timelines, sales commitments, warehouse capacity, customer needs, farming seasonality, margins, cash flow, and budget assumptions.

Objectives of this Role

The COO will help Exapta operate with more clarity, consistency, accountability, and financial visibility.

This person will translate company priorities into practical action across leadership, operations, sales, warehouse, inventory, purchasing, R&D, vendors, external production, finance, HR, and administration.

The COO will also help the company make stronger business decisions by connecting operations and financials. This includes understanding how sales seasonality, product demand, inventory levels, gross margin, discounts, freight, payroll, operating expenses, vendor timing, staffing, and cash flow affect profitability and planning.

This is not a pure finance role, but the COO must be financially fluent enough to partner well with the controller, bookkeeper, CPA, CEO, and leadership team.

• Partner with the CEO, General Manager, Director of R&D, sales leadership, warehouse team, and other leaders to create alignment, clarity, and accountability across the business
• Lead the operating rhythm of the company through scorecards, KPIs, leadership meetings, planning, priority tracking, and follow-up
• Strengthen operational execution across warehouse flow, inventory, purchasing, fulfillment, vendors, suppliers, and external production
• Improve the connection between sales commitments, customer expectations, inventory availability, warehouse capacity, vendor timelines, and farming seasonality
• Support better budgeting and forecasting by helping identify the business assumptions behind revenue, margin, inventory, staffing, expenses, and cash needs
• Use operational and financial information to help leaders understand what is happening, where performance is off track, and what needs to change
• Support leaders in solving root-cause issues, improving communication, developing their teams, and moving priorities forward
• Help oversee administrative areas such as HR, compliance, contracts, insurance, legal coordination, and outside professional relationships as needed
• Build the leadership capacity needed for the CEO to step further out of day-to-day operations over time

What Success Looks Like

Within the first 12 months, Exapta should have a stronger, more aligned leadership team and a business that runs with greater clarity, consistency, and accountability.

The General Manager, Director of R&D, sales leadership, warehouse team, and other key leaders should feel better supported and more aligned. Communication between departments should improve. Sales, warehouse, inventory, purchasing, vendors, customers, finance, HR, and administrative needs should be more connected.

The company should also have better budgeting and forecasting practices, with assumptions that better reflect sales seasonality, product demand, inventory needs, margin expectations, staffing, cash flow, and operational capacity.

Most importantly, company priorities should move forward with fewer delays, fewer dropped balls, stronger follow-through, and better visibility into the operational and financial health of the business.

• Senior operational leadership experience as a COO, President, Integrator, Director of Operations, VP of Operations, Business Unit Leader, or similar role
• Direct experience in agriculture, farm equipment, equipment parts, manufacturing, warehouse operations, distribution, fulfillment, or another physical product business
• Strong understanding of inventory, purchasing, vendors, order flow, fulfillment, shipping, margin, pricing, customer urgency, and operational accountability
• Working knowledge of budgets, forecasts, cash flow, gross margin, payroll, operating expenses, inventory, and financial reporting
• Experience using operational and financial data to improve planning, challenge assumptions, and support better decisions
• Experience leading onsite teams and partnering with leaders across operations, sales, warehouse, purchasing, R&D, finance, vendors, and customer-facing teams
• Comfort coordinating with outside advisors and service providers, including accounting, HR, legal, insurance, and compliance partners
• Strong judgment, direct communication, relationship-building skills, and the ability to balance accountability with support
• Strong preference will be given to candidates with experience in agriculture, farming, farm equipment, ag equipment, equipment parts, dealer parts, implement dealers, warehouse operations, inventory, fulfillment, distribution, manufacturing, production, supply chain, vendor management, purchasing, budgeting, forecasting, or financial management for a product-based business.

This role offers a base salary of $160,000 to $185,000, performance‑based bonus opportunities, and an equity opportunity.

For the right candidate, this role may provide a pathway to future executive leadership opportunities based on performance, leadership impact, and long-term contribution to the business.

This position is based onsite in McPherson, Kansas and requires regular interaction with employees, customers, vendors, suppliers, financial partners, and leadership.

Travel will be required periodically for customer engagement, industry events, trade shows, supplier relationships, vendor relationships, and business priorities.