General Manager - The Shepherd Chemical Company

The Shepherd Chemical Company manufactures metal-based chemicals that are essential to technologies for consumer safety, environmental sustainability, advanced product performance and industrial process efficiency. Partnering with industries from fragrance and personal care to petrochemicals and polyurethanes, Shepherd collaborates on both standard and custom co-developed metal chemistries. In collaboration with our customers, we are working to solve some of their most complex problems through the synthesis, scale up, and commercialization of inorganic and organic metal compounds.

Our employees scale projects from “concept to container”, travel the world to visit customers and attend industry conferences, and participate in community initiatives for health, wellness, safety and philanthropy. Performing meaningful work with trusted, talented colleagues is our formula for success and being a great place to work. Every day, our employees relentlessly pursue Shepherd’s Core Purpose and Core Values.

The Shepherd Chemical Company is looking for a strong, proven General Manager to lead business strategy, operations, people, and financial performance. As General Manager, you will set direction, develop the senior leadership team, and build the accountability needed to deliver sustainable growth, profitability, operational excellence, and a strong customer experience.

You will thrive here if you act with urgency, make sound decisions with imperfect information, communicate candidly, and align diverse stakeholders around clear priorities.

Responsbilities

• Develop a Winning Commercial Strategy
• Define and execute a market-driven strategy for profitable growth and competitive advantage.
• Turn customer and market insight into clear priorities, KPIs, resource decisions, and cross-functional action.
• Lead strategic planning, risk management, growth initiatives, and communication with key stakeholders and the Board.

Drive Operational Excellence

• Build an operating system that improves quality, efficiency, reliability, and execution.
• Eliminate chronic losses, strengthen manufacturing capability, and embed continuous improvement.
• Use performance data to identify risk, accelerate corrective action, and improve results.
• Build Team Culture and Leadership Capability
• Build and develop a strong senior leadership team.
• Create a high-performance culture grounded in integrity, ownership, collaboration, and enterprise thinking.
• Set clear expectations, delegate thoughtfully, and hold leaders accountable for results and customer experience.
• Profit and Loss
• Own revenue, margin, operating effectiveness, and capital allocation.
• Anticipate risk, pursue opportunities, and deliver financial commitments.
• Balance near-term performance with long-term value creation and communicate results transparently to the General Leadership Team.

What You Bring

• Executive leadership experience spanning strategy, commercial performance, operations, people, and P&L results.
• Success building senior leadership capability and accountable, high-performing teams.
• Strong business and financial judgment, including decisions involving revenue, margin, capital, and enterprise risk.
• A record of translating customer and market insight into coordinated execution.
• Experience improving manufacturing or operational performance through structured problem-solving and continuous improvement.
• Credibility with executive and Board-level stakeholders, paired with high integrity, resilience, and personal ownership.

Measures of Success

• A clear commercial strategy is understood and executed across the business.
• Growth, margin, operating, and capital commitments are achieved.
• Quality, efficiency, manufacturing capability, and customer experience improve.
• The leadership team operates with greater capability, alignment, and accountability.

EEO Statement

The Shepherd Material Science Company is an Equal Opportunity Employer. Employment decisions are made without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, ancestry, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age (40 or over), disability, veteran status or other characteristics protected by law.