Plant Controller

About the role

The Plant Controller (Hybrid Plant Finance Leader) is an embedded, on-site FP&A leader who serves as the primary finance partner to plant leadership – supporting the Plant Director and functional leaders with decision-ready financial insight, forecasting, and operational performance management.

Responsibilities

• Serve as the primary embedded finance partner to the Plant Director and plant leadership team; provide clear, actionable insights that improve decision-making, accountability, and plant performance.
• Serve as the primary escalation point for plant finance questions, analytics, and performance management.
• Own the plant forecasting and budgeting cadence: build and maintain driver-based forecasts, lead annual budget development at the plant level, and surface forward-looking implications (what is changing, why, and what happens next).
• Deliver performance management: produce timely variance analysis (actual vs. budget/forecast/prior), identify root causes, quantify financial impact, and recommend actions; ensure commentary is understandable to non-finance leaders.
• Own and deliver plant KPI dashboards and digital reporting tools (standard packages plus self-service views) that improve visibility to labor efficiency, overhead absorption, scrap/rework, inventory health, and margin performance; continuously enhance these tools to reduce manual effort and improve decision speed.
• Support plant inventory performance and working-capital drivers: monitor inventory accuracy/health KPIs, track drivers impacting inventory and COGS, and coordinate with Accounting/Cost Accounting on reconciliations and close alignment (without booking entries).
• Support annual physical inventory execution in partnership with Supply Chain (process owner) and Accounting/Internal Audit: provide readiness analytics, variance/root-cause analysis, reconciliation support, and follow-through tracking on corrective actions.
• Support budget justification packages for plant leadership: quantify resource requests, productivity initiatives, and capex/opex tradeoffs using clear driver logic and scenario analysis.
• Lead or drive cost reduction programs through direct engagement with production and support teams: identify savings opportunities, size the financial impact, track initiative performance versus targets, and report progress through dashboards and operating rhythms.
• Partner cross-functionally with Operations, Supply Chain, Engineering, and Production to understand cost drivers and evaluate improvement opportunities; participate in operating rhythms (daily/weekly huddles, production reviews) as needed to support decision-making.
• Ensure finance processes and plant performance reporting are SOX-aware and compliant with company policies: support control design/operation by partnering with Accounting and Internal Audit; identify and escalate control gaps and support timely remediation.
• Lead and develop a small plant finance team focused on FP&A / operational finance analytics (e.g., plant analyst(s), performance analyst(s)); ensure consistent forecasting, KPI reporting, and decision support cadence.
• Provide finance support for plant capex planning and reporting (in partnership with Engineering as project owner): ROI models, spend tracking vs. budget, and post-investment benefit tracking.
• Partner with Cost Accounting (process owner) to support the standard cost-setting cycle: provide operational/driver inputs, challenge and validate assumptions, identify when standards/routings no longer reflect reality, and ensure the management view of variances is explainable and decision-useful (no journal entry booking).
• Translate plant needs into finance requirements, support reporting/data quality enhancements, and partner with IT/GPO on prioritization and adoption.

Requirements

• Requires a bachelor’s degree in finance, Accounting, Business, or a related discipline; 8+ years of progressive experience in manufacturing finance, plant FP&A, cost/operations finance, or business partnering roles, or any combination of education and experience which would provide an equivalent background.
• Demonstrated ability to lead a small team while also operating as a hands-on individual contributor is required.
• Experience with plant costing, standard cost governance, supporting annual physical inventories, and leading cost reduction initiatives is strongly preferred.
• SAP proficiency (FI/CO and/or manufacturing-related modules/data flows) is a major plus.
• MBA, CPA, CMA, or similar certification preferred but not required.

Qualifications

• Strong understanding of manufacturing financial drivers and plant KPIs (conversion cost, labor efficiency, overhead absorption behavior, material usage, scrap/rework, inventory and working-capital drivers).
• Advanced analytical and problem-solving capabilities; strong financial modeling skills and ability to perform scenario and sensitivity analyses.
• Demonstrated ability to build and maintain KPI dashboards, digital reporting tools, and standardized performance packages that are used in operating rhythms (daily/weekly/monthly).
• Ability to communicate complex financial information in plain language to plant leaders; strong presentation skills and executive presence.
• Strong collaboration and influencing skills; ability to build trust across operations and support decisions without formal authority.
• People leadership capability: hiring, coaching, prioritization, and quality control for a small plant finance team while also delivering individual-contributor analysis and executive-ready outputs.
• Ability to serve as a clear escalation point—triaging ambiguous questions, pulling together data quickly, and providing crisp recommendations under time pressure.
• Process discipline and attention to detail: documentation of assumptions, version control, and repeatable reporting routines.
• Comfort operating in environments with evolving systems and imperfect data; bias toward timely, directionally correct insights while improving precision over time.
• Strong proficiency in Microsoft Excel; experience with reporting/BI tools a plus; SAP proficiency is a major plus.

Skills and Abilities

• Strong understanding of manufacturing financial drivers and plant KPIs (conversion cost, labor efficiency, overhead absorption behavior, material usage, scrap/rework, inventory and working-capital drivers).
• Advanced analytical and problem-solving capabilities; strong financial modeling skills and ability to perform scenario and sensitivity analyses.
• Demonstrated ability to build and maintain KPI dashboards, digital reporting tools, and standardized performance packages that are used in operating rhythms (daily/weekly/monthly).
• Ability to communicate complex financial information in plain language to plant leaders; strong presentation skills and executive presence.
• Strong collaboration and influencing skills; ability to build trust across operations and support decisions without formal authority.
• People leadership capability: hiring, coaching, prioritization, and quality control for a small plant finance team while also delivering individual-contributor analysis and executive-ready outputs.
• Ability to serve as a clear escalation point—triaging ambiguous questions, pulling together data quickly, and providing crisp recommendations under time pressure.
• Process discipline and attention to detail: documentation of assumptions, version control, and repeatable reporting routines.
• Comfort operating in environments with evolving systems and imperfect data; bias toward timely, directionally correct insights while improving precision over time.
• Strong proficiency in Microsoft Excel; experience with reporting/BI tools a plus; SAP proficiency is a major plus.