Plant HR Manager

About the Role

We are seeking a hands-on Plant HR Manager to lead people operations in a fast-paced manufacturing environment. This role blends strategic HR leadership with day-to-day execution-supporting leaders and frontline teams across talent acquisition, onboarding and training, employee relations, compliance, and workforce analytics. You'll be a visible presence on the plant floor, translating operational needs into practical people solutions that strengthen performance, engagement, and retention.

What You'll Do

• Partner with operations leaders by maintaining a strong plant-floor presence - listening, observing, and helping resolve workforce issues with operators, supervisors, and leaders.


• Use people data to identify trends, recommend actions, and drive accountability to results.


• Build trusted relationships with leaders and employees to improve communication, engagement, and retention.

Talent Acquisition, Onboarding & Training

• Develop and execute recruiting strategies for hourly and salaried roles in a competitive labor market (trade schools, universities, community partnerships, and creative sourcing channels).


• Own and continuously improve onboarding, delivering an effective in-house orientation and ensuring rapid integration into production environments.


• Lead and execute continuous training and cross-training initiatives, including development and maintenance of training materials and manuals.

Compensation & Workforce Analytics

• Support compensation planning processes aligned to market benchmarks and internal equity, including salary bands, merit increases, and pay-for-performance programs (within approval frameworks).


• Maintain employee census data and deliver workforce analytics to support leadership decision-making.

Employee Relations & Culture

• Serve as the primary point of contact for employee relations, including conflict resolution, investigations, coaching, and performance management.


• Lead disciplinary actions and terminations with thorough documentation in alignment with policy and employment law.


• Strengthen a positive, high-performance culture aligned with operational excellence.

Compliance & Safety

• Ensure compliance with federal, state, and local employment regulations.


• Partner with safety leadership to support incident investigations, corrective actions, and ongoing compliance.


• Own and continuously update the employee handbook and HR policies to reflect legal compliance and organizational standards.

Leave Administration

• Manage leave of absence programs including FMLA, ADA, workers' compensation, and CT state-specific leaves.


• Ensure documentation accuracy and coordinate effectively with payroll and benefits partners.

Labor Reporting & Operational Support

• Build and maintain dashboards and recurring reports (daily/weekly/monthly) for operations leadership.


• Track and analyze key labor KPIs (overtime, headcount, attendance/absenteeism, turnover, productivity, and labor efficiency) and highlight meaningful variances.


• Identify trends and root causes; translate findings into clear recommendations and action plans that improve labor performance.


• Support labor planning and forecasting by partnering with operations on staffing needs, schedule changes, and workload drivers.


• Partner with operations leaders to identify cost drivers and improvement opportunities.

Experience & Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree and 5–8+ years of progressive HR experience in a manufacturing or light industrial environment.


• SHRM-CP or PHR certification preferred.


• Fluency in Spanish preferred.


• Strong knowledge of OSHA, FMLA, ADA, and employment laws.


• Experience supporting production environments required; with direct hands on production experience preferred.


• Strong analytical skills and HRIS/reporting capability.


• Accountability mindset-sets clear priorities and measurable goals, follows through on commitments, and uses KPIs and metrics to drive results.


• Process- and systems-oriented problem solver-comfortable using data, root-cause thinking, and simple, repeatable workflows to improve outcomes.


• Working knowledge of Lean/continuous improvement concepts and structured quality management practices (standard work, document control, audits, corrective actions) within a manufacturing environment.

Key Strengths for Success

• Operational acumen and experience in a manufacturing environment.


• Strategic, forward-looking business partner who anticipates people and operational needs and helps leaders drive change and growth.


• Employee-centered leadership with a proven ability to engage, develop, and support employees while partnering with leaders to build a high-performing culture.


• Data-driven decision making and strong follow-through.


• Conflict resolution and employee relations expertise.


• Compliance and risk awareness.


• Influential communication and professionalism at all levels.


• Continuous improvement mindset.