Senior Operations Leader

About the role

The Senior Manager, Distribution Center Operations serves as the site leader for a large-scale distribution center and is accountable for end-to-end operational performance within the four walls of the facility.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead the distribution center through major operational transitions, including changes to systems, processes, organizational structure, or operating model.
• Provide direct leadership to cross-functional operational teams during transition periods to ensure continuity of service, safety, and inventory integrity.
• Act as the single accountable leader for operational readiness, execution discipline, and risk mitigation, ensuring transitions are absorbed into stable, auditable, steady-state operations.
• Own daily, weekly, and monthly performance of the distribution center, including OTIF, throughput, cost, safety, and inventory accuracy.
• Lead and develop all internal DC operations teams across inbound, receiving, returns, destructions, order management, and administrative workflows.
• Balance internal execution with 3PL throughput to ensure customer commitments and carrier cutoffs are consistently met.
• Serve as the senior escalation point for operational disruptions, service risks, and execution issues originating within the DC.
• Partner closely with Inventory Management to ensure inventory accuracy, quarantine discipline, release readiness, and new product stabilization are consistently maintained.
• Protect the customer promise by enforcing disciplined execution during peak periods, operational changes, and system transitions.
• Lead, coach, and develop a multi-layer leadership team including managers, supervisors, team leads, and professional contributors.
• Establish a strong performance culture grounded in safety, accountability, standard work, and continuous improvement.
• Chair Tier 2/Tier 3 daily management routines and enforce root-cause problem-solving discipline.
• Lead the primary operational interface across Inventory, Transportation, Operational Excellence, EH&S, Technology, and 3PL leadership.
• Ensure clear decision rights and disciplined handoffs between governance functions and execution teams.
• Provide operational leadership during technology deployments, process changes, and network transitions.
• Owning operating cost performance for internal DC operations, including labor, consumables, and operating expense control.
• Ensure compliance with safety, regulatory, and quality requirements, maintaining audit readiness at all times.
• Identify and mitigate operational risks that could impact service, cost, safety, or compliance.

Key Outputs / Success Measures

• Stable operational performance through periods of change
• Sustained on-time, in-full (OTIF) performance
• Predictable, steady-state operations across multiple shifts
• High inventory accuracy with clean audit outcomes
• Strong safety performance with minimal incidents

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Logistics, Supply Chain, Operations, Engineering, or related field
• 8-10 years of progressively responsible distribution/warehouse operations experience, including senior-level leadership of large, multi-shift distribution centers with significant labor and throughput complexity
• Demonstrated experience leading complex, enterprise-scale operational transitions, (e.g., operating model changes, network changes, major system implementations) and then owning steady-state performance
• Proven ability to lead large, multi-layer organizations through change, including managers, supervisors, and front-line teams
• Strong operational, financial, and safety leadership capability with accountability for service, cost, and compliance outcomes
• Strong understanding of WMS-enabled operations, inventory control, and order management flows

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience operating in hybrid models where internal teams govern execution performed by 3PL partners
• Experience leading operations through system or process transformations with minimal service disruption
• Leverage Lean / Continuous Improvement leadership experience in a distribution environment
• Experience operating with formal tiered management systems (e.g., daily management, escalation routines, performance cadence)
• Experience partnering closely with IT, inventory, and transportation teams during periods of operational change