Plant manager

Plant Manager

Retained Search Conducted by Anchor Talent & Consulting | Greater Chicago Area

Anchor Talent & Consulting has been retained on a confidential basis to identify a Plant Manager for our client, a privately-held specialty chemicals manufacturer. The client's name is withheld at this stage of the search and will be shared directly with qualified, interested candidates.

Does This Sound Like You?

• You've led a chemical manufacturing site before, and you're ready for one with real scale: the reactors, the revenue, and the P&L weight to match your experience.
• You'd rather build a leadership team from the ground up than inherit one that's already running smoothly. Recruiting, coaching, and holding people accountable energizes you; it doesn't wear you out.
• You're comfortable in a union environment: at the negotiating table when a contract is on the line, and on the shop floor every other day of the year, building trust with the people who run it.
• Process Safety Management and RMP compliance aren't a source of dread for you. They're a discipline you've practiced, and you know the difference between paper compliance and a program that actually works.
• You think in contribution margin, not just cost centers. Payroll, overtime, maintenance spend, CapEx justification: you can own a site's gross margin like it's your own business.

If two or three of those hit close to home, keep reading.

About the Opportunity

Our client is a specialty chemicals manufacturer with a multi-decade operating history and a legacy of strong technical and engineering discipline. This facility is one of the largest and most profitable sites in the company's manufacturing network.

Operationally, the site is in solid shape: safety performance, quality, and cost control are relatively stable. The real opportunity, and the real challenge, is the leadership team around the role. Several key seats are open, interim, or thin, and the person who takes this position will spend their first year doing what every strong plant manager eventually has to do: recruit, build, and pull together the team that can carry the weight of a 24-7 batch manufacturing operation.

This isn't a caretaker assignment. It's a build.

What You'll Own

Rebuild the Leadership Bench. You'll recruit, coach, and develop department heads across maintenance, quality, supply chain, and technical functions, turning a stretched, gap-filled organization into a team that runs itself. This is, by a wide margin, the biggest lever for long-term success at this site.

Own the Full Financial Picture. From contribution margin down to site gross margin, you're accountable for payroll, overtime, maintenance and contractor spend, working capital, and inventory across raw materials, finished goods, and spare parts. You'll drive the annual budgeting cycle, defend capital investment requests in a competitive corporate process, and report site performance monthly to company leadership.

Lead HSE and Regulatory Compliance. This is an OSHA PSM and EPA RMP-regulated facility with hazardous chemical processes and annual federal and state environmental reporting. You're ultimately accountable for every compliance aspect of the site, working hand-in-hand with the HSE Manager to keep programs, and the culture behind them, strong.

Navigate Labor Relations. This is a union facility. You'll sit on the labor-management and joint safety committees, engage daily with hourly employees on the floor, and be at the table for future contract negotiations.

Grow the Business. The plant is running at solid utilization today, with meaningful room to add volume. You'll partner with sales and commercial teams to fill capacity and position the site for future product and chemistry investment.

Who Thrives in This Role

The people who've succeeded in this seat before came from different starting points: chemist, chemical engineer, plant floor up through supply chain or production, but they share a few things in common. They're comfortable being the final word on compliance and safety. They see gaps in a team as an opportunity, not a burden. And they know this job can't be done from behind a desk; it's a boots-on-the-floor role, every week, in every department.

What You Bring

Must-Haves:

• Manufacturing leadership experience in specialty or batch chemicals, or a closely related process industry
• Background as a chemist, chemical engineer, or equivalent technical/operational path through a chemical plant
• Experience operating in, and ideally negotiating within, a unionized manufacturing environment
• Working knowledge of Process Safety Management (PSM) and RMP-regulated operations, including risk assessment methods such as PHA, HAZOP, or LOPA
• Demonstrated financial and commercial acumen: P&L or site-level margin ownership, budgeting, and capital project justification
• A track record of building, developing, or significantly strengthening a leadership team

Nice-to-Haves:

• Experience with ACC Responsible Care Management System (RCMS) or ISO 14001 environmental management systems
• Exposure to global or multi-site manufacturing organizations, including technology or product transfers between plants
• MBA or equivalent advanced business training
• SAP or comparable ERP experience

Compensation & Growth

This position carries a competitive base salary plus an annual bonus target, commensurate with the scope of leading a flagship site in the client's manufacturing network. Full compensation details will be shared with qualified candidates as the process progresses.

The client operates multiple manufacturing sites globally, and this role offers a genuine path to broader operational or corporate leadership for the right person over time.

About This Search

Anchor Talent & Consulting is conducting this search on a retained, confidential basis. All inquiries and candidate information are held in strict confidence, and the client's identity will be disclosed only after an initial conversation with our team.

Let's Talk

If you're the kind of leader who'd rather build a team than babysit one, who can hold your own across a negotiating table and a P&L review in the same week, and who wants the challenge of running a flagship plant in a growing specialty chemicals company, we'd like to hear from you.

Reach out to Anchor Talent & Consulting to start a confidential conversation.