Role: Processing Team Leader Location: Magheralin, Craigavon, Co. Armagh Shifts: Rotating two-week pattern Week 1: MondayFriday, 8:00 AM 4:00 PM Week 2: MondayFriday, 4:00 PM 12:00 AM Role Purpose: As a Team Leader in Cheese Production, you will play a pivotal role in embedding Leprinos culture and values within your team, driving operational excellence, and fostering a high-performance, inclusive environment. You are the first line of leadership on the production floorvisible, proactive, and deeply engaged in the day-to-day coordination of your team to meet safety, quality, cost, delivery, and environmental goals. Responsible for: As a Team Leader, you will be a visible and proactive presence on the production floor, leading by example and embodying Leprinos values of urgency, adaptability, inclusion, and mutual respect. Youll coordinate daily operations, delegate tasks, and ensure production targets are consistently met, while fostering a culture of accountability and continuous improvement. Youll serve as the first point of contact for your team and other departments, resolving issues at the team level and escalating when needed. Regular communication with the Cheese Manager and collaboration with fellow Team Leaders will be key to driving alignment and achieving business goals. Your leadership style should be driven, supportive, respectful, and inclusivecreating an environment where team members feel empowered, informed, and united. Success in this role means delivering consistent results while living Leprinos culture every day. Reports to: Departmental Manager Key Relationships: Other Team leaders, Managers, team members in own and related departments, QA and maintenance personnel. If you wish to apply, please submit your CV by 28th September 2025 Responsibilities: RELATIONSHIP DEVELOPMENT Build positive relationships with other departments, utilising these positive relationships to assist the delivery of results through your team, and provide support towards the success of other teams. Build and maintain strong relationships with Site Management, establishing two-way communication and accurate provision of information to support the efficient running and continuous improvement of the site. The Team Leader will allocate work, manage staffing levels and ensure attendance, grievance and disciplinary matters are dealt with in accordance with the companys policies and procedures. The Team Leader will ensure the capability and competence of their team members by regularly performing competence assessments. Working in conjunction with the HR Manager and Department Manager, the Team Leader will ensure that all team training needs are identified, monitored and reviewed, and development plans are put in place. The Team Leader will ensure all Personal Protective clothing and equipment is worn in accordance with company policy. The Team Leader will provide regular coaching, guidance and advice on day-to-day team issues and problems. Work closely with the Food Safety team to ensure that work practices are followed in line with food safety guidelines and that issues are communicated effectively, and an ethos of working together to overcome problems is encouraged. The Team Leader will lead minor Continuous Improvement projects, driving improvements in Health and Safety, process efficiency and product quality. Through effective team leadership, promote a harmonious working environment based upon the building blocks of the companys Vision and Values and take action to address individual or group behaviour that may be detrimental to positive working relationships in accordance with company procedures. Specific Responsibilities: Operations As the Food Processing Team Leader, you will be accountable for the effective execution of daily production plans across both the string and shred departments. This includes the preparation of accurate daily usage records to ensure all operational teams are informed of the designated cheese pallets for each scheduled production run. You will be responsible for verifying production code information at the commencement of each shift and in advance of subsequent shifts, ensuring alignment with the production schedule. Maintaining precise and timely documentation of all production adjustments and operational checks is essential to uphold regulatory compliance and product traceability. Ensure the effective utilisation of all problem stock to minimise residual inventory and reduce waste You will continuously monitor process controls, guiding your team to make necessary adjustments that keep production within specification and minimise waste. Ingredient usage must be tracked closely to ensure accuracy and availability for each product code. Daily plant audits (Gemba walks) will be conducted to identify equipment, process, or operational deficiencies, and youll support your team in taking corrective action when non-conformance issues arise. Working in partnership with the maintenance team, youll help identify potential and actual plant issues, develop action plans, and ensure follow-through to minimise downtime and protect product integrity. In the event of breakdowns, youll lead recovery efforts and ensure root cause investigationssuch as RCAs (Root Cause Analysis)are completed, with corrective actions documented in the relevant SOPs or decision trees. Youll also ensure your team accurately records base-level data to support timely reporting of key performance indicators such as Y&E, OEE, and other metrics. Health and Safety Our health and safety vision as a production team is to ensure that we have an effective world-class safety culture which ensures that our colleagues are empowered, bought into and have the tools, skills and knowledge to think safely, work safely and get home safely every day Maintain focus on workplace safety, ensuring all activities are carried out in accordance with Pictorial Standard Operating Procedures (PSOPs) Develop, enhance processes for identifying, analysing, controlling and monitoring health and safety risks within the department to ensure full confidence in our processes.Ensuring all activities are carried out in accordance with safe working procedures, control measures identified via risk assessment and COSHH assessment. Ensure that the circumstances of any accidents or incidents are recorded in detail, reported via specified methods and that any supporting documentation is completed promptly. Support the accident investigation process within the department. Observe, act and immediately report any issues that may pose a threat to a safe working environment. Proactively encourage the reporting of SIRs and Good Saves within the department. Implement Stop, Think, Act where appropriate Actively support the Site Safety Committee and site-wide safety initiatives to effectively deliver the Health and Safety Strategy. Take responsibility for the welfare and well-being of team members, working closely with HR and the Occupational Health team to address any concerns and to ensure that all available supports are offered to the employee. Operational Excellence / Continuous Improvement Drive a positive culture of continuous improvement that engages the whole Processing team, supported by excellent communication. Ensure KPIs are used effectively to provide clear visibility of department performance, and tier 1 boards are used to identify opportunities for improvement. Ensure that key data is collated and used in a daily, weekly and monthly review to drive key focus areas of improvement. Ensure that through effective training, coaching and communication, employees are equipped with the tools, techniques and methodologies necessary to tackle any problem to a reasonable probability of success regardless of complexity. Develop and implement effective Standard Work, identifying best practices and building these into PSOPs Ensure tier one meetings are part of standard work, ensuring that issues are identified and addressed Use RCAs to identify opportunities and drive improvements. Develop the use of focus and Short Interval Control boards to engage the team and support problem-solving, ensuring all stakeholders are informed and aligned on projects and progress. Develop strategies within the string and shred departments that actively support a culture of Preventing Problems Before They Happen. Raise the awareness within the team of the cost drivers within the business and actively seek to engage the Team on opportunities to improve efficiency and eliminate waste. Quality Quality is a Core Value for Leprino Foods. Getting it Right First Time and eliminating Problem Product is essential to ensure we achieve the combination of performance and value we need to be the World's Best Mozzarella Manufacturer Champion an excellent culture of food safety and be uncompromising on quality, driving continuous improvement and developing a zero-defect culture that ensures our whey products are produced with exemplary safety standards, which achieves being audit ready every day. Actively drive improvement in Right First Time, product quality and housekeeping through the reduction of variability within the process using 5S standards and control charts. Ensuring effective and appropriate escalation of issues, timely corrective action and excellent communication to key stakeholders. Standardise, automate and ensure increased visibility around both CIP validation and other cleaning/sanitisation tasks, not covered by our OT process control systems. Continually drive improvement in the standards of hygiene and housekeeping through the involvement and ownership of the Team Introduce initiatives which will develop and improve asset care awareness within the department Sustainability Sustainability is becoming increasingly important to all our stakeholders. Operations have an essential role in supporting Leprino Foods in meeting its goals and objectives Develop and embed an improved focus on Sustainability alongside the more traditional Operations metrics. Fully support a structured innovation process for improvement, leveraging new technology and best practices. Ensure awareness of site 7 environmental standards and ensure that both the string and shred departments' processes operate in accordance with the requirements of ISO14001 and the Integrated Pollution Prevention Control licence. Progressively raise the awareness of the whole team as to the cost drivers within the business and the key opportunities to eliminate waste, such as detergent usage, spills, etc. Undertake any other duties as considered by the company to be within the scope of the role. Other Responsibilities Ensure the role is performed with due regard for the requirements of the Company Equal Opportunities Policy and the Bullying and Harassment Policy. Undertake any other duties as considered by the company to be within the scope of the role of Operations Team Leader. CORE VALUES Every employee at every level within Leprino must act, behave and operate in line with the company's core values. Quality - We succeed by making better products, ones that consistently meet our customers expectations and are produced with exemplary food safety standards. We believe if its worth doing, its worth doing right. Service - We recognise our success is tied to the success of our valued customers. Despite our size and scale, we pay attention to the small details that matter. When our customers need help, we strive to be surprisingly responsive problem solvers. Competitive Price - We provide the best combination of performance and value. Customers get more for their money with Leprino Foods. We work hard to run an efficient business so we can always be competitively priced. Ethics - We strive to do the right thing all the time. Were principled and fair in all of our dealings. We take personal responsibility to do our very best. Promises made are promises kept. OUR CULTURE COMMITMENTS To further support our company values, we also work to ensure we meet our culture commitments at Leprino, which are; We focus on people We are accountable We collaborate We are open to change PERSON SPECIFICATION Applicants are required to explain on the application form how they demonstrate the knowledge, skills and behaviours specified: Qualifications and Training Essential GCSE pass level in Maths & English to enable the post holder to understand the significance of numerical data and communicate effectively in writing Competent in the use of Word, Excel and PowerPoint Desirable Formal 3rd Level qualification or accredited training in any of the following: Supervisory Management Food Science / Technology field. Experience Essential 1-3 years of recent and relevant experience in shift supervision and team leadership in a production or manufacturing environment, with evidence of having monitored KPIs and introduced initiatives to ensure consistent achievement of production targets. Able to demonstrate experience in using standardised work instructions. Desirable As essential, but in the food/dairy production environment Understands the significance of SOPs (i.e. everyone doing things the same way, giving rise to the right first approach) Specialist Knowledge Essential Able to demonstrate knowledge of how safe working practices are applied and how a safe place of work (SPOW) can be enhanced through operator inclusivity Evidence of having carried out Risk Assessments and hazard elimination Demonstrate experience of working within a manufacturing environment where multiple workstations interact to deliver an efficiently manufactured product Evidence of having applied a structured problem-solving approach Desirable Previous experience working with production line machinery e.g. dicers, baggers. IOSH qualification Detailed knowledge of production processes within a food/dairy production environment Able to demonstrate how his/her excellent communication skills have enhanced the team effort Able to demonstrate leadership skills and the ability to use own initiative Able to demonstrate how he/she has enhanced teamwork Ability to plan and utilise resources effectively Able to identify and effectively use the skills within his/her team Ability to utilise resources effectively Strong organisation and planning skills with the ability to prioritise effectively Track record of having achieved excellence Understands the fundamental difference between leadership and management Behaviours Have a track record of being self-motivated Have a track record of demonstrating trust and respect for others Have the right attitude where others are positively influenced by his/her actions and behaviour Evidence of a Go and See approach to managing the team/process Have a track record to demonstrate how he/she has embraced change not just accepted it Able to demonstrate integrity Able to demonstrate how he/she took ownership of specific targets/goals and delivered on commitments made Desirable Able to give examples where ops:- *Used their own initiative *Applied problem-solving techniques *Made decisions on their own *high level of communication Able to demonstrate how he/she has positively influenced change in the workplace Circumstances With sufficient notice, be adaptable to work different rota patterns on different teams.