Senior Process Engineer - Holland, Michigan
DISHER is currently partnering with a leading food manufacturer in Holland, MI to fill their Senior Process Engineer position. This role is ideal for someone who can design, optimize, and continuously improve food production processes in a complex manufacturing environment while balancing efficiency, scalability, food safety, and operational goals.
What it’s like to work here:
This organization is committed to operational excellence, quality, and continuous improvement. Success in this environment requires strong process thinking and systems analysis, a lean mindset, technical problem solving, data-driven decision making, cross-functional leadership, regulatory awareness, and a continuous improvement mindset. The culture values accountability, collaboration, and a shared drive to create efficient, scalable, and compliant food production systems.
What you will get to do:
- Design and develop food production processes, including mixing, cooking, baking, extrusion, forming, packaging, and material handling systems.
- Create and maintain Process Flow Diagrams (PFDs), P&IDs, and equipment specifications.
- Conduct line capacity analysis and throughput modeling to assess operational performance.
- Evaluate process capability and identify opportunities for yield, efficiency, and quality improvements.
- Lead pilot testing, scale-up activities, and validation of new processes.
- Support capital project planning from conceptualization through commissioning.
- Develop detailed equipment specifications and actively participate in vendor selection.
- Review equipment layouts to ensure compliance with hygienic design standards.
- Oversee installation, Factory Acceptance Testing (FAT), Site Acceptance Testing (SAT), and startup of new production lines.
- Ensure timely and cost-effective completion of projects.
- Analyze production data to pinpoint bottlenecks and process inefficiencies.
- Implement Lean, Six Sigma, or comparable methodologies to enhance performance.
- Drive initiatives to improve yield, minimize waste, and optimize ingredient utilization.
- Support Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) improvement efforts.
- Conduct root cause analysis to address recurring process challenges.
- Ensure all process designs adhere to USDA and GMP requirements.
- Integrate hygienic design principles within equipment layout and selection.
- Collaborate with Quality and Food Safety teams on validation and verification protocols.
- Contribute to HACCP plan development and risk assessments for new processes.
- Maintain compliance with OSHA and environmental regulations.
- Partner with R&D throughout new product development and commercialization phases.
- Work closely with Maintenance to support equipment reliability and maintainability.
- Collaborate with Operations to resolve production challenges.
- Provide training for operators on new equipment and process implementations.
- Participate in sustainability initiatives focused on energy, water, and waste reduction.
- Develop comprehensive standard operating procedures (SOPs) for new processes.
- Maintain thorough engineering documentation and change management records.
- Ensure proper validation and recordkeeping for regulatory audits.
- Support the management of process control strategies and integration of automation.