Sanitation Lead - Overnight - $28.00/hour + applicable shift differential

Role Summary

The Sanitation Lead is a hands-on leader responsible for directing overnight sanitation and ensuring equipment and production areas are clean, sanitized, and ready for production. This role leads the sanitation team, verifies work, and proactively identifies and resolves issues that could impact food safety, sanitation, or production start-up.

The successful candidate demonstrates strong leadership, initiative, dependability, and problem-solving skills while partnering with Quality, Maintenance, Production, and other departments to ensure production readiness.

What It Takes to Succeed

• Strong, hands-on leadership and accountability
• Proactive approach to identifying and resolving issues
• Commitment to food safety, sanitation, and safety
• Ability to coach, train, and hold team members accountable
• Strong troubleshooting and problem-solving skills
• Sense of urgency and attention to detail
• Effective cross-functional communication
• Dependability and flexibility
  
  

Core Responsibilities

Shift Leadership & Team Development: Lead the overnight sanitation team.

• Assign work, set priorities, and monitor sanitation progress
• Proactively adjust resources to meet sanitation timelines
• Hold team members accountable for safe, accurate, and timely work
• Provide hands-on leadership, coaching, and training
• Support onboarding and skill development of sanitation team members
• Identify training needs and reinforce proper sanitation practices
  
  

Sanitation & Food Safety: Ensure production readiness.

• Ensure cleaning meets SSOP, MSS, GMP, and food safety requirements
• Oversee equipment teardown, cleaning, sanitizing, and reassembly
• Verify completed work and coordinate corrective cleaning as needed
• Support visual inspections, ATP testing, and sanitation verification
• Maintain accurate and timely sanitation documentation
  
  

Cross-Functional Support: Identify and resolve issues.

• Proactively identify sanitation, equipment, and operational concerns
• Partner with Quality, Maintenance, Production, and other departments to resolve issues
• Coordinate equipment teardown, repairs, and reassembly with Maintenance
• Communicate concerns that could impact food safety or production start-up
• Provide clear shift handoffs and escalate outstanding issues
  
  

Continuous Improvement: Strengthen sanitation processes.

• Develop and update SOPs, SSOPs, cleaning procedures, and work instructions
• Identify opportunities to improve sanitation effectiveness, efficiency, and consistency
• Support corrective actions and root-cause problem solving
• Participate in sanitation, food safety, and operational improvement initiatives
  
  

Qualifications

• High school diploma or equivalent required
• Food manufacturing sanitation experience required
• Ability to effectively read, understand, speak, and communicate in English as required to follow safety and sanitation procedures, complete documentation, lead the sanitation team, and coordinate with Quality, Maintenance, Production, and leadership
• Sanitation lead or supervisory experience strongly preferred
• Knowledge of GMPs, SSOPs, MSS, chemical sanitation, allergen controls, and food safety practices
• Experience with equipment teardown, cleaning, sanitizing, and reassembly
• Knowledge of chemical safety, PPE, and Lockout/Tagout (LOTO)
• Strong leadership, initiative, troubleshooting, communication, and documentation skills
• Ability to work overnight hours and required overtime
  
  

Physical Requirements

• Ability to stand and walk for extended periods
• Ability to lift up to 50 lbs regularly; heavier lifting with assistance as needed
• Ability to bend, reach, push, pull, and perform repetitive tasks
• Ability to work around water, cleaning chemicals, equipment, and varying temperatures
• Ability to wear required PPE
  
  

Work Environment

• Food manufacturing environment with strict GMP, sanitation, and food safety requirements
• Overnight work around wet surfaces, cleaning chemicals, production equipment, and noise
• PPE required in production areas
• Exposure to varying temperatures, including temperature-controlled areas
• Adherence to food safety policies, including restrictions on jewelry and artificial nails
• Smoke-free campus; no smoking permitted on company property