Production Manager Jobs in Foster, RI (NOW HIRING)

THE ROLE 

The Production Supervisor reports to the Assistant Plant Manager or designated site Operations leader and provides hands-on leadership for the day-to-day operation of assigned production and Packhouse areas. This position supervises hourly Production Assistants in the greenhouse and packhouse and is accountable for safe, timely, efficient, and specification-compliant production. The Production Supervisor coordinates labor, materials, equipment, food safety, quality, sanitation, and cross-functional support to achieve the site production plan and meet customer requirements. 

WHAT YOU’LL DO 

Production Planning and Daily Execution 

• Lead assigned production and Packhouse operations, including applicable packing, sorting, weighing, labeling, case packing, palletizing, staging, and production-support activities. 

• Review the daily production plan, pacing or timing expectations, product priorities, staffing, materials, equipment status, and operational risks before the shift begins. 

• Translate the production plan into clear assignments, hourly expectations, and priorities, and confirm employees understand the work, specifications, safety requirements, and expected pace. 

• Monitor production throughout the shift and adjust labor, sequence, line assignments, breaks, materials, or support resources to address changing volume, product availability, downtime, or customer priorities. 

• Ensure finished cases are produced, labeled, packed, palletized, recorded, and transferred according to the approved schedule, work instructions, and product specifications. 

• Maintain a visible floor presence, remove operational barriers, provide hands-on support when needed, and ensure work is completed with urgency without compromising employee safety, food safety, quality, or accuracy. 

• Complete an effective shift handoff that communicates production status, remaining work, staffing, equipment issues, product concerns, materials, sanitation needs, and follow-up actions. 

Team Leadership and Labor Management 

• Supervise Production Assistants, Leads, temporary employees, and other assigned hourly team members and ensure employees are punctual, prepared, productive, and working effectively as a team. 

• Develop employee schedules and daily staffing plans, manage attendance, sick time, paid time off, breaks, and coverage, and minimize unnecessary overtime while meeting the production plan. 

• Review and approve timekeeping information and promptly resolve or escalate missed punches, schedule discrepancies, attendance concerns, and other payroll-related exceptions. 

• Train and coach employees on standard work, production pace, quality expectations, food safety, sanitation, equipment use, ergonomics, and safe work practices, and verify understanding through observation and follow-up. 

• Maintain training and cross-training records and develop flexible team coverage for critical tasks, equipment, products, and operating conditions. 

• Set clear expectations, provide timely feedback, recognize strong performance, complete performance appraisals, and address performance, attendance, or conduct concerns in coordination with Operations leadership and Human Resources. 

• Participate in hiring, onboarding, retention, employee development, and succession planning and promote a respectful, inclusive, accountable, and high-performing work environment. 

• Remain calm and professional during changing conditions, communicate respectfully, address concerns consistently, and escalate employee-relations or safety issues through the appropriate channels. 

Food Safety and Regulatory Compliance 

• Follow the facility GMPs. 

• Execute daily processes that enforce food safety protocols and maintain compliance. 

• Support the efforts of the company to maintain our food safety system and quality programs. 

• Ensure employees follow applicable food-safety plans, standard operating procedures, sanitation controls, personal-hygiene requirements, personal protective equipment requirements, and product-handling practices. 

• Ensure required production, food-safety, sanitation, cooler, temperature, traceability, verification, and other assigned records are accurate, complete, legible, and submitted on time. 

• Responsible for ongoing involvement in key programs and verifying that critical operations (such cleaning, allergen handling, HACCP, etc) are always managed by qualified, trained personnel. 

• Maintain required product identification, lot control, traceability, line clearance, label verification, and segregation of held, rejected, reworked, or nonconforming product. 

• Monitor cooler, production, and storage conditions and promptly escalate temperature deviations, contamination risks, pest activity, damaged product, foreign-material concerns, or other food-safety issues. 

• Partner with FSQA to complete inspections, pre-operational checks, audits, investigations, corrective actions, and employee retraining, and verify assigned actions are sustained. 

• Stop or hold production when an employee-safety, food-safety, quality, labeling, traceability, or regulatory concern requires immediate control and notify the appropriate site leaders. 

Product Quality and Process Control 

• Verify product meets applicable specifications for quality, weight, count, appearance, integrity, packaging, label, date code, lot code, and case configuration. 

• Inspect product and production processes routinely and ensure leaves or other ingredients that are damaged, contaminated, pest-affected, diseased, tip-burned, dropped, or otherwise outside specification do not enter finished packages. 

• Use approved scales, checks, samples, records, and verification methods to monitor process performance and finished-product consistency. 

• Ensure employees understand defect standards and product disposition requirements and consistently follow approved inspection, rejection, rework, hold, and escalation procedures. 

• Report potential pest, pathogen, crop-quality, raw-material, packaging, or finished-product concerns promptly to Growing, FSQA, and Operations leadership as applicable. 

• Monitor yield, giveaway, rework, scrap, and product damage and implement approved corrective actions to reduce waste without compromising quality or compliance. 

Sanitation and Area Readiness 

• Maintain assigned production, Packhouse, cooler, storage, staging, stair, dock, roof-access, and support areas in clean, orderly, safe, and production-ready condition. 

• Schedule and verify required cleaning and sanitation of floors, drains, sinks, tables, tools, equipment, furniture, coolers, storage areas, and other assigned spaces. 

• Ensure employees follow approved cleaning and sanitation procedures, chemical controls, tool controls, personal protective equipment requirements, and pre-operational release expectations. 

• Coordinate sanitation activities with production needs and provide hands-on support when required to complete cleaning safely, thoroughly, and on schedule. 

• Identify facility, pest-control, housekeeping, sanitation, or environmental conditions that could affect employees or products and ensure they are corrected or escalated. 

Materials, Inventory, and Traceability 

• Monitor, request, receive, organize, and control labels, corrugated cases, packaging, harvesting supplies, and other materials required for assigned production operations. 

• Use the assigned ERP, inventory, production, or reporting systems to record material usage, finished goods, waste, transfers, adjustments, counts, and other required transactions accurately and on time. 

• Maintain appropriate inventory levels, identify shortages or obsolete materials early, and coordinate replenishment with Planning, Procurement, Distribution, Growing, FSQA, or other partners as applicable. 

• Ensure packaging and labels are stored, issued, verified, reconciled, and returned or destroyed according to applicable control and traceability requirements. 

• Conduct or support cycle counts and inventory investigations and resolve or escalate discrepancies that could affect production, traceability, cost, or customer service. 

Equipment Readiness and Safe Operations 

• Ensure required production equipment, scales, printers, labelers, conveyors, tools, workstations, and material-handling equipment are available, inspected, set up, and used according to approved procedures. 

• Ensure employees receive required equipment and task training and follow machine guarding, ergonomics, material-handling, personal protective equipment, and other applicable employee-safety requirements. 

• Respond to equipment interruptions, place equipment in a safe condition, submit accurate maintenance requests, and coordinate with Maintenance to prioritize repairs and reduce avoidable downtime. 

• Ensure only trained and authorized employees perform adjustments, clearing, cleaning, or other equipment interactions and that lockout/tagout and hazardous-energy requirements are followed when applicable. 

• Document and communicate recurring equipment, process, material, or layout issues and participate in root-cause analysis and corrective-action planning. 

• Maintain a safe work environment, address hazards promptly, report incidents and near misses, and participate in investigations and corrective actions. 

Performance Management and Cross-Functional Coordination 

• Track and communicate applicable production KPIs, including safety, schedule attainment, labor utilization, throughput, productivity, overtime, yield, waste, quality, downtime, sanitation completion, and inventory accuracy. 

• Lead daily huddles and routine performance reviews that communicate priorities, results, risks, staffing, food-safety and quality observations, and required follow-up actions. 

• Evaluate production methods, staffing patterns, workflows, pacing, training, and layouts and recommend improvements that increase safety, quality, service, efficiency, and employee effectiveness. 

• Use structured problem-solving and production data to identify root causes, implement approved corrective and preventive actions, and verify improvements are sustained. 

• Partner with Growing, Distribution, FSQA, Sanitation, Maintenance, Planning, Procurement, Human Resources, and other teams to coordinate product flow, labor, materials, equipment, quality, and customer requirements. 

• Communicate regularly with the Assistant Plant Manager or designated Operations leader regarding performance, staffing, employee issues, material constraints, downtime, food-safety or quality concerns, and significant operational risks. 

• Support audits, trials, new products, process changes, projects, emergency response, and business-continuity activities as assigned. 

• Perform duties as directed by leadership and accomplish related operational results as required. 

WHO YOU ARE 

MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS 

• At least three years of progressively responsible production, manufacturing, food-processing, warehouse, or related operations experience, including at least one year leading or supervising hourly employees. 

• Demonstrated experience planning labor, assigning work, managing schedules and attendance, controlling overtime, coaching employees, and holding a team accountable for daily results. 

• Working knowledge of applicable food-safety, GMP, sanitation, quality, traceability, labeling, temperature-control, and employee-safety requirements in a production environment. 

• Experience using production schedules, pacing or labor plans, standard work, performance metrics, and operational data to manage a fast-paced shift. 

• Experience with ERP, inventory, production-reporting, warehouse-management, or similar business systems and the ability to maintain accurate records and transactions. 

• Ability to inspect product, packaging, labels, and production processes and make timely decisions regarding defects, holds, rework, waste, or escalation. 

• Demonstrated ability to train, motivate, coach, and communicate with a diverse hourly workforce in a respectful and consistent manner. 

• Strong proficiency with Microsoft Office applications and the ability to use assigned scheduling, timekeeping, reporting, collaboration, and business systems. 

• Ability to work in greenhouse, production, Packhouse, warehouse, cooler, dock, storage, and office environments and use required personal protective equipment. 

• Ability to stand and walk for extended periods and frequently bend, reach, push, pull, and lift or move up to 50 pounds. 

• Availability to work assigned shifts and provide weekend, holiday, off-shift, and emergency coverage when business needs require. 

• Valid authorization to work in the United States. 

• An associate or bachelor’s degree in operations, supply chain, food science, business, agriculture, manufacturing, or a related field is preferred. 

• Previous experience in fresh produce, greenhouse operations, controlled-environment agriculture, food manufacturing, natural or organic foods, or another regulated production environment is preferred. 

• Food-safety, HACCP,...