Sr. Project Operations Manager

fairlife, LLC is a Chicago-based nutrition company that creates great-tasting, nutrition-rich and dairy products to nourish consumers.

With over $3B in annual retail sales, fairlife’s portfolio of delicious, lactose-free, real dairy products includes: fairlife® ultra-filtered milk; Core Power® High Protein Shakes, a sports nutrition drink to support post-workout recovery; fairlife® nutrition plan™, a nutrition shake to support the journey to better health.

A wholly owned subsidiary of The Coca-Cola company, fairlife, LLC has been recognized by both Fast Company and Nielsen for its industry leading innovation.

To learn more about fairlife and its complete line of products, please visit fairlife.com.

job purpose:   

The Sr. Project Operations Manager leads all plant-side operational readiness, startup, and commissioning activities for an expansion, serving as the bridge between project execution and steady-state operation to ensure a safe, compliant and high-performing transition.  

responsibilities:  

• Lead plant-side operational readiness and startup for a major expansion by building and directing a cross functional team responsible for all activities required to successfully commission and transition new lines to steady state plant ownership. 

• Serve as the primary liaison between the project organization and plant leadership, ensuring plant operational needs, risks, and insights are fully represented in project planning, design decisions, and execution. 

• Own change management and communication to the plant, clearly translating project decisions, design changes, and operational impacts to plant teams while intentionally managing plant involvement in project forums to avoid disruption and overload. Engage plant leaders in critical discussions as needed to inform decisions and ensure readiness. 

• Oversight of hiring, training, and SOP development aligned with the project timeline and production ramp up to ensure a successful handoff to the plant team. 

• Ensure asset, maintenance, and material readiness by establishing reliable maintenance programs for all new equipment and systems, including, critical spare parts identification and inventory, preventive maintenance strategies and schedules. 

• Coordinate and execute all plant infrastructure tie-ins, including utilities, access points, traffic patterns, and facility interfaces, ensuring activities are properly planned, communicated, and executed with minimal impact to existing operations. 

• Ensure quality, safety, and environmental readiness by coordinating QA requirements including sanitary design reviews, validation activities, and QA equipment readiness. 

• Ensuring all safety programs, environmental policies, permits, and regulatory considerations are incorporated into project planning and startup and applying existing plant safety and food safety standards to all new equipment and processes. 

• Incorporate lessons learned and best practices from existing fairlife operations and prior expansions into design and execution, including participating in equipment FATs and benchmarking visits to other fairlife plants to validate design, readiness, and operational standards. 

• Develop, align, and communicate startup and ramp up curves that meet business, quality, and service requirements.  Actively manage early life performance. 

• Drive and measure startup success using defined KPIs, including EHS, product quality and regulatory compliance, employee engagement and morale throughout the change, production ramp up performance, and long-term equipment reliability during the first 2–3 years of operation. 

skills/qualifications required:  

• Minimum of 10 years of progressive manufacturing or plant leadership experience, including direct involvement in major capital projects, startups, or commissioning. 

• Experience in dairy, brewing, food, or pharmaceutical manufacturing; aseptic processing experience strongly preferred. 

• Strong leadership capability with a track record of building trust, influencing cross functional teams, and deli