Senior Protein Engineer Jobs in Wisconsin (NOW HIRING)

At Link Snacks, we show up hungry, roll up our sleeves, plaid or otherwise, and dive straight into the hard work. We don’t hide from challenges; we hunt them down. We push harder, move faster, and take the kinds of big swings that built this business in the North Woods of Wisconsin four decades ago.

We’re everyday people who deliver extraordinary results. Innovation, creativity, and urgency aren’t buzzwords, they’re expectations. And just like the real protein snacks we make across our global house of brands: Jack Link’s®, Lorissa’s™ Organic Snacks, Golden Island®, BiFi®, Peperami® and KOOEE!® to name a few, there’s nothing artificial about us. What you see is exactly what you get: humble, gritty, passionate people who show up every day ready to not just be a participate in the meat snack industry that the Link Family created, but to move faster, innovate harder and keep raising the bar so high, the rest of the world needs a ladder just to see it.

Dominating this space across the world takes a team. A team that runs together, succeeds together, and celebrates together. A team that’s full of relentless energy and spirit that can only be fueled by one thing: a fist full of our delicious meat snacks.

Real Meat Protein. Real People. Real Results. THAT is Link Snacks.

JOB DESCRIPTION SUMMARY

The Site Reliability & Engineering Manager is the senior technical leader for the Minong facility, responsible for maintenance, reliability, facilities, utilities, and site engineering support. This role provides strategic leadership to ensure safe, dependable, compliant, and cost-effective operations while supporting long-term plant performance and growth.

A key focus of this position is building a strong reliability culture through Reliability-Centered Maintenance (RCM), predictive maintenance, asset lifecycle management, disciplined CMMS execution, and development of a high-performing technical team across a multi-shift operation.

This role also serves as the primary site partner to Corporate Engineering, supporting capital planning, project execution, commissioning, startup readiness, maintenance integration, documentation, training, spare parts planning, and long-term asset ownership.

Annual Salary: $135k - $138K

 DIRECT REPORTS: Yes

DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES (Essential Job Functions)

Leadership & Culture

• Lead, coach, and develop a high-performing maintenance, reliability, and engineering organization.
• Build a culture focused on safety, food safety, reliability, accountability, and continuous improvement.
• Develop supervisors, planners, coordinators, technicians, and technical specialists through coaching and performance management.
• Partner with Operations, Quality, Safety, Supply Chain, HR, and Corporate Engineering as a member of the Plant Leadership Team.

Reliability Strategy & Asset Management

• Develop and execute the site's reliability strategy to improve uptime, asset performance, and total cost of ownership.
• Lead RCM, equipment criticality assessments, FMEA, RCFA, corrective actions, and asset lifecycle planning.
• Expand predictive and condition-based maintenance programs, including vibration, thermography, ultrasound, lubrication, and related technologies.
• Reduce reactive maintenance while increasing planned, preventive, and predictive work.

Maintenance Operations & CMMS Leadership

• Lead maintenance operations supporting packaging, processing, smokehouses, utilities, facilities, and related plant assets.
• Own and continuously improve the Somax CMMS system, including work order execution, planning, scheduling, closure, and documentation.
• Drive schedule compliance, backlog management, PM completion, maintenance productivity, and standardization of task lists, job plans, BOMs, and asset records.

Engineering Leadership & Technical Support

• Serve as the facility's primary engineering and technical resource.
• Evaluate equipment performance, process constraints, utility systems, and manufacturing opportunities to improve safety, quality, reliability, and throughput.
• Lead technical problem-solving for complex equipment failures, chronic reliability issues, equipment selection, system modifications, and facility upgrades.
• Support implementation of new technologies, automation solutions, productivity initiatives, and plant optimization efforts.

Capital Projects & Corporate Engineering Partnership

• Function as the primary site partner for Corporate Engineering initiatives, capital planning, and project prioritization.
• Coordinate site resources for equipment installations, facility upgrades, utility improvements, and capital projects.
• Ensure project designs address food safety, operator safety, reliability, maintainability, sanitation, and operational requirements.
• Lead site commissioning, startup, equipment acceptance, operational readiness, and transition to sustainable ownership.
• Develop maintenance strategies, spare parts plans, PM programs, training, and technical documentation for new assets.

Facilities, Utilities & Infrastructure

• Lead reliability and maintenance of facility infrastructure, buildings, grounds, and utility systems.
• Ensure reliable operation of compressed air, boilers, refrigeration, wastewater, HVAC, electrical distribution, and other critical services.
• Develop long-term facility and infrastructure improvement plans and coordinate supporting vendor and contractor activities.

Food Safety, Regulatory & Environmental Compliance

• Ensure maintenance and engineering activities comply with USDA, HACCP, GMP, SSOP, OSHA, LOTO, machine guarding, environmental, and company food safety requirements.
• Promote sanitary maintenance practices, hygienic equipment design, and elimination of maintenance-related food safety risks.
• Support audits, regulatory inspections, and corrective action programs in partnership with Food Safety & Quality.

Budget Management & Cost Control

• Develop and manage annual maintenance, reliability, facility, and utility-related budgets.
• Monitor labor, parts, contractor, utility, and facility expenditures while identifying cost-saving opportunities.
• Support capital budget development, project justification, and effective use of maintenance resources.

Vendor, Contractor & Materials Management

• Manage contractor selection, performance, safety compliance, service quality, and site requirement adherence.
• Oversee spare parts strategy, storeroom optimization, supplier partnerships, and vendor agreements that support reliability, safety, and cost objectives.

Performance Management & Continuous Improvement

• Establish and manage maintenance and reliability KPIs, including uptime, schedule compliance, PM completion, backlog health, MTBF, MTTR, repeat failures, predictive maintenance compliance, cost performance, and contractor performance.
• Use data analytics and reliability metrics to identify opportunities and lead cross-functional improvement initiatives.

REQUIRED EDUCATION AND EXPERIENCE

Bachelor’s degree in engineering, Maintenance Management, Operations Management, or related technical field preferred; equivalent technical training and progressive leadership experience will be considered.

Experience

• 8+ years of progressive maintenance, reliability, engineering, or manufacturing leadership experience.
• 5+ years managing maintenance, engineering, reliability, or technical teams in a multi-shift manufacturing environment.
• Food manufacturing or other highly regulated manufacturing experience preferred.
• Demonstrated success with RCM, predictive maintenance, TPM, CMMS, asset management, capital projects, and cross-functional leadership.

REQUIRED SKILLS, KNOWLEDGE, AND ABILITIES

Technical

• Strong knowledge of mechanical, electrical, pneumatic, hydraulic, automation, utility, and industrial control systems.
• Ability to interpret schematics, drawings, P&IDs, OEM documentation, and technical data.
• Strong understanding of asset management, reliability engineering, RCA, FMEA, and failure elimination methods.

Leadership

• Proven ability to lead, coach, develop, and hold technical teams accountable.
• Strong conflict resolution, decision-making, and reliability culture-building skills.

Business & Project Management

• Strong budgeting, financial management, contractor/vendor management, and project execution capabilities.
• Ability to manage competing priorities, lead cross-functional teams, and influence without direct authority.

Communication & Strategic Thinking

• Excellent communication skills with the ability to translate technical information for technical and non-technical audiences.
• Strategic, analytical, and problem-solving mindset with the ability to align reliability initiatives to business objectives.

PHYSICAL DEMANDS:
The physical demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to be successfully perform the essential functions of this job.  Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

While performing the duties of this job the employee is regularly required to stand, walk, use hands to finger, handle, or feel, lift and/or move up to 25 pounds, and talk or hear.  The employee is occasionally required to sit, and reach with hands and arms.  The employee must occasionally lift and/or move up to 50 pounds.  Specific vision abilities required by this job include close vision.

WORK ENVIRONMENT:
The work environment characteristics described here are representative of those an employee encounters while performing the essential functions of this job. The work environment is a plant / office setting with varying degrees of temperatures and noise levels. Exposure to manufacturing equipment movement and wet / slippery floors. Travel may be required.

Equal Employment Opportunity Employer
Jack Link's is an equal opportunity employer and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation and gender identity, national origin, disability status, protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law.

E-Verify
Jack Link's provides the Social Security Administration (SSA) and, if necessary, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), with information from each new Team Member’s Form I-9 to confirm work authorization. IMPORTANT: If the Government cannot confirm that you are authorized to work, we are required to provide you written instructions and an opportunity to contact SSA and/or DHS before taking adverse action against you, including terminating your employment. We do not use E-Verify to pre-screen job applicants or to re-verify current employees and may not limit or influence the choice of documents presented for use on the Form I-9. In order to determine whether Form I-9 documentation is valid, we use E-Verify’s photo screening tool to match the photograph appearing on some permanent resident and employment authorization cards with the official U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services’ (USCIS) photograph. If you believe that Jack Link’s has violated our responsibilities under this program or has discriminated against you during the verification process based upon your national origin or citizenship status, please call the Office of Special Counsel at 1-800-255-7688 (TDD: 1-800-237-2515).