Associate Director - Inventory & Product Optimization

Internal Management & Management Support Applicants:

Automatic notification to your current manager will be initiated upon selection for interview. This applies to all current P or M level candidates.

Relocation Assistance Eligible:

Yes

Referral Payout Eligible:

No

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Management Level:

M3

Tyson Foods is seeking an experienced Associate Director to lead a function within our Inventory & Property Optimization (IPO) organization. IPO consolidates Enterprise Asset Management (EAM), Enterprise Inventory Management (EIM), and Maintenance, Repair, and Operations (MRO) under a single charter: optimize the inventory and physical assets Tyson carries so the enterprise reports a stronger financial position, improves working capital and free cash flow, and gives investors confidence in the balance sheet.

This role leads an organization of approximately fifteen to twenty team members through a combination of people leaders and senior individual contributors, and is accountable for a defined portfolio spanning fixed assets, direct materials, work in process, packaging, spare parts, and operating supplies. Depending on assignment, the portfolio emphasizes either field execution and plant-level value realization across the enterprise manufacturing footprint, or the technology, data, and governance capability that makes accurate capture and trusted reporting possible. Both require the same core profile: enterprise perspective, financial fluency, credible command of SAP S/4HANA, and the ability to lead leaders.

This is a strategic leadership position, not a work-management position. The Associate Director is expected to determine where the department invests its capacity, quantify the expected return, defend that judgment to senior leadership, and deliver against it. Success is measured in inventory position, working capital, asset utilization, and data reliability, not in activity completed.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities

• Define and own a multi-year strategy for the assigned function, including capability requirements, sequencing, and the resourcing case, prioritized by business return rather than preference or precedent.

• Own an opportunity pipeline from identification through sizing, prioritization, and delivery, and make the case for redeploying capacity when the evidence changes.

• Drive measurable improvement in inventory record accuracy, slow-moving and obsolete exposure, MRO stock value, spare parts strategy, and idle or underutilized equipment redeployment.

• Direct solution design, configuration, integration, and governance across SAP S/4HANA and connected platforms so that accurate data capture at the point of work is the easy path, not the disciplined exception.

• Establish and enforce enterprise standards for master data, stewardship, reporting definitions, and information lifecycle across the inventory and asset domains.

• Ensure accounting, GAAP, SOX, food safety, quality, and workplace safety requirements are engaged during design rather than discovered at implementation.

• Represent IPO in operating plan, capital planning, architecture, and investment governance forums, negotiating for funding, delivery capacity, and decisions that serve inventory and asset outcomes.

• Build the department’s standing with plant, complex, and business unit leadership through delivered results rather than mandate, and secure commitments without direct authority over their operations.

Leadership and Development

• Lead through people leaders while simultaneously leading senior and principal individual contributors who carry enterprise scope and require technical partnership rather than task direction. These are different disciplines and both are required.

• Lead a predominantly distributed workforce, establishing a rhythm of accountability, clear escalation paths, and honest performance conversation at distance.

• Own the advancement of engineering capability within the organization, validating placements against demonstrated scope and building documented development paths toward senior individual contributor levels.

• Build succession depth for every leadership and principal contributor position in the organization.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Supply Chain, Engineering, Operations Management, Information Systems, Computer Science, Finance, or a related field, or an equivalent combination of education and relevant experience. An advanced degree is preferred.

• 8+ years of progressive experience across manufacturing operations, supply chain, inventory or asset management, ERP solution delivery, or enterprise data governance. 5+ years leading teams and 2+ years leading through other leaders.

• SAP S/4HANA command. Working fluency across the inventory and asset landscape including PM, MM with inventory and warehouse management, PPPI, PS, FSQA, and FICO. Depth in every module is not expected; the ability to hold a credible design conversation in all of them is. Experience on an S/4HANA implementation, migration, or major process redesign is strongly preferred.

• Inventory and asset economics. Demonstrated fluency in days inventory on hand, turns, carrying cost, reserve and write-off mechanics, replacement asset value, and the relationship between service level and working capital.

• Multi-site accountability. Proven results in an asset-intensive manufacturing environment with direct ownership of inventory or asset outcomes rather than reporting on them.

• Data and analytics literacy. Practical command of warehouse management systems, cloud data platforms, governance tooling, and analytics environments such as Power BI, Palantir, or Tableau, sufficient to interrogate the data personally rather than wait for a report.

• Influence and communication. The ability to move between a storeroom conversation and an executive review without losing either audience, and the credibility to hold a position, or recommend against a popular request, when the evidence supports it.

• Experience in protein, food, or another regulated manufacturing environment, and exposure to Lean, Six Sigma, TPM, or reliability-centered maintenance methodologies, are preferred.

Location and Travel

Onsite in Springdale, Arkansas. Travel of approximately 10 to 20 percent is required including presence at production facilities across the Tyson footprint and deliberate in-person time with a predominantly on-site team.

This position does not offer sponsorship benefits. Resume must be included for consideration.

Work Shift:

1ST SHIFT (United States of America)

For Professional Management levels, internal applicants should either upload a resume to their application OR complete their application fully showing current and past work experience in the sections provided.

The successful candidate(s) must be willing and able to perform the physical requirements of the job with or without a reasonable accommodation.

Tyson is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will be considered without regard to race, national origin, color, religion, age, genetics, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability or veteran status.

We provide our team members and their families with paid time off; 401(k) plans; affordable health, life, dental, vision and prescription drug benefits; and more.

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