General Manager

About us

Lions Prep is the UK’s highest-rated meal plan service, cooked by chefs. We prepare, cook and deliver fresh and healthy meals to your door so you can save time and eat healthy at the same time. This is a truly exciting time to be considering being part of our journey.

We work with people from all different backgrounds and communities and recognise our own biases. We strive to create a strong sense of belonging and believe we will be better equipped to achieve our goals by building a team that approaches problems from different angles, using different perspectives and experiences to solve problems. All qualified applicants will be considered and we have no regard to age, ethnicity, ability, gender, gender expression, gender identity, nationality, race, religion, or sexual orientation the more the merrier and together we can achieve greatness

Mission:

We inspire busy people to eat well and live better - Delivering chef-cooked meals crafted from quality, locally sourced produce.

Vision statement:

At Lions Prep, we're more than just a food company. We’re helping create a food system that's fair and transparent, where everyone has access to ethically sourced, quality food. With tech at the forefront of our strategy, we’re continuously innovating whilst staying true to our people. Our commitment to a healthy planet is never compromised.

Our Values:

Empowerment: We empower our people to make strong, independent decisions with confidence

Transparency: We share information openly and with intention

Open Communication: We communicate directly and honestly

High Performance: We foster an environment that attracts, retains, and rewards high performance

Agility: We encourage flexibility in our people by reducing blockers and prioritising their creativity and productivity

Your Impact:

To lead, engage and inspire the Management, Senior Leadership Team and colleague communities working across the manufacturing fulfilment unit to level up to our next chapter whilst always achieving our key performance indicators and exceeding our customer expectations.

In this role, you'll need to think on your feet, getting your hands dirty in the day-to-day while always thinking ahead, maintaining a strategic perspective. Our team here may be lean, but we're a force to be reckoned with. We aim to keep business streamlined by embracing tools and technology to eliminate mundane tasks and allow our talented minds to focus on bigger things. Where some companies might have an extra QC checking their goods in, we equip our goods in team with the knowledge, resources and technology to be self-sufficient. We are evolving from a large scale commercial kitchen which is what we were last year, to becoming the biggest company in food manufacturing. In our company you will have the opportunity to stretch your limits, discover your true potential, and collaborate with a dedicated team.

The role reports into our COO and requires someone with dedication, resilience and a relentless drive for greatness to match, inspire and lead the way with the rest of our leadership team.

Responsibilities:

Key Accountabilities Performance Measures

• Development, delivery and governance of the Manufacturing Plan for the site:
• Delivery of the Budget
• Delivery of Annual Productivity Plan eg Cost per Box (Direct Labour, Indirect Labour, Waste - all underpinned by our proprietary technology through our custom built ERP)

Own and lead the Ethical and H&S action plans for site ensuring the standards, ethical code and audit requirements are met:

• Attainment and progress against Health, Safety and Environmental Strategy - we are currently hiring for a new SHE Manager and have an external partner supporting in the interim
• Delivery of key Safety KPIs to help maintain and consistently achieve GMP
• Customer Service Measures (Trust Pilot ratings)
• Ethical Audit Performance e.g. SEDEX

Meet the necessary customer, food safety, compliance and environmental codes and standards, addressing any gaps and risks and, ensuring our people are trained, safe and capable:

• Attainment and progress against site Food Safety Strategy
• Delivery of Food Safety KPIs
• Customer Service and Complaints Measures eg CPMU
• External Audit compliance improvement eg. BRC - although at present we are not looking to attain this across our current unit
• Environmental KPIs eg reduction in CO2/tonne produced
• Legal and compliant and in line with insurance requirements

Identify and narrow the capability gaps, and maximising the potential of our people through delivery and engagement in talent and development activity

• Internal Talent Hire Ratio
• Development Plans in place linked to long-term succession
• Capability confirmation progress to competency requirements
• Check-in and Calibration Compliance to Technology systems adoption

Delivery of the resource plan and management of the risks associated in labour planning to ensure sufficient labour to meet the production plan, including management of the employee relations agenda e.g. trade unions, colleague consultation forums etc

• Agency Ratio
• Production plan attainment
• Colleague Turnover
• Employment Relations Relationship

Ensuring that our customer demand can be met through effective decision-making and the feasibility of new product production

• Customer Service Measures eg OTIF
• Delivery of forecasted P&L through effective NPD to target cost

Delivery of the P&L through effective budget controls and management e.g. labour, forecasting, waste, overheads, indirect labour, expenses, compliance and forecasting and delivery of the 1-3 year capital plan

• P&L Budget delivery
• ROCE
• Input to design and execution of the site Investment Plan
• Capital Spend to Phasing Plan

Effective management of the supply chain through Goods to Despatch, managing Goods in and controlling external storage costs

• Service Delivery KPIs
• Adherence to preferred Supplier Lists
• Managing Supplier Penalties or Incentives/Rebates
• Management of Logistics providers and optimisation of delivery cost/box

Ensure effective and risk-managed Technology infrastructure is maintained at the site through ownership and governance of standards and embedding of projects

• Adherence to rollout plans for technology solutions
• Project deliverables met
• Decision Making Authority
• Site Budget Control and projections
• Capital Expenditure/Overhead Spend as per Financial Guide
• Financial Spend including direct, indirect and capital expenditure
• Recruitment, promotion and development activities
• Weekly Performance/ Weekly Customer Response.

Knowledge, Skills and Experience

• Demonstrable operational and leadership experience, ideally in a fast-moving consumer goods environment ideally direct to consumer / brand
• Strong experience leading and building high-performing teams and influencing a broad range of stakeholders
• High degree of tenacity, resilience, determination and persistence to ensure goals are achieved and the team stays motivated and focused
• Extensive experience having lead safety programmes, underpinned by IOSH/NEBOSH or equivalent and specific safety critical training appropriate to the site e.g. Legionella Duty Holder Training
• Understanding of and experience relating to ethical codes of practice and standards, informed on modern slavery and customer standards
• In-depth understanding of food safety and hygiene legal requirements, and experience with GMP, operating a food-safe factory
• In-depth understanding of external environmental requirements and experience operating a facility in line with legislative expectations
• Experience having led large teams and in managing change and culture across multiple departments
• Understanding of engagement drivers - colleague experience and external stakeholders (press/communities/retailers/consumers/public)
• Experience having led a multi-functional team e.g. HR, Finance, Commercial, Technical, ideally within a technology or e-commerce structure
• Experience having led pay negotiations, worked with Trade Unions and employee forums and managed an agency supply provision desirable
• Understanding of legislative and customer requirements for compliance training in both H&S and Food Safety
• Understanding of the external market factors impacting retailers and consumer trends
• Strong financial acumen and experience having built product costings
• Strong experience managing a P&L and understanding of levers and drivers or costs.
• Experience having built, set and managed budgets across a range of disciplines.
• Understanding of supply chain end-to-end, key customers and suppliers at site level
• Robust and well-developed finance skills; comfortable dealing with complex financial data and weighing up risks and choices
• Experience having identified and lead business change and improvement activities and initiatives including capex and investment projects
• Understanding of modern manufacturing practices and technology