Director of Operations Resume Example That Passes ATS Screening
Director of Operations roles sit at the intersection of strategy and execution, and hiring committees expect your resume to reflect both. The candidates who land interviews are the ones who can point to P&L ownership, cross-functional team leadership, and measurable operational improvements rather than simply listing the departments they oversee. This example shows how to present executive-level operations experience with the financial and organizational specifics that boards and VPs of Operations want to see.
Full Resume Sample
Miriam Osei-Bonsu
Director of Operations
Professional Summary
Operations leader with 12 years of progressive experience across manufacturing, logistics, and corporate operations in the consumer packaged goods industry. Currently directing a 280-person operations division across 3 production facilities with full P&L ownership of a $94M annual operating budget. Drove a 22% reduction in cost-per-unit over 3 years through lean manufacturing adoption, vendor renegotiation, and warehouse automation. Track record of inheriting underperforming operations and building the systems, teams, and accountability structures needed to turn them around.
Experience
Director of Operations
Church & Dwight Co. · Ewing, NJ · Mar 2021 - Present
- Direct all manufacturing, warehousing, and distribution operations across 3 facilities in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Georgia, managing 280 employees including 6 direct reports (plant managers, logistics director, continuous improvement manager)
- Own the $94M annual operating budget with full P&L accountability, consistently delivering results within 1.5% of plan across 12 consecutive quarters while absorbing two unplanned raw material cost increases totaling $3.8M
- Led the implementation of a lean manufacturing program across all 3 plants, reducing cost-per-unit by 22% over 3 years through waste elimination, line balancing, and standardized work instructions that cut changeover times by 35%
- Negotiated a 3-year logistics contract consolidation with two regional carriers, reducing annual freight spend by $2.1M while improving on-time delivery from 91% to 96.5% across all distribution channels
- Built and launched an internal operations leadership development program that has promoted 8 supervisors to manager-level roles in 2 years, reducing external hiring costs by $340K and improving management retention to 94%
Senior Operations Manager
Henkel Corporation · Stamford, CT · Jun 2017 - Feb 2021
- Managed daily operations for a 140-person adhesives manufacturing plant producing 45M units annually, reporting to the VP of North American Operations and overseeing production, quality, maintenance, and EHS functions
- Reduced scrap rate from 4.2% to 1.8% over 18 months by implementing statistical process control on 6 high-volume production lines and retraining 60 operators on revised standard operating procedures
- Led the $6.5M capital project to install an automated palletizing and shrink-wrap system, completing the project 3 weeks ahead of schedule and achieving full ROI within 14 months through labor reallocation and throughput gains
- Designed and executed a production scheduling overhaul that increased overall equipment effectiveness from 72% to 84%, eliminating 120 hours of unplanned downtime per quarter through predictive maintenance integration
Operations Manager
Colgate-Palmolive · Morristown, NJ · Aug 2013 - May 2017
- Supervised production operations for a personal care product line generating $180M in annual revenue, managing a team of 85 across 3 shifts with responsibility for output targets, quality standards, and safety compliance
- Achieved a 99.2% order fill rate for 18 consecutive months by redesigning the demand planning interface between operations and supply chain, reducing stockout events from 14 per quarter to 3
- Drove OSHA recordable incident rate from 3.1 to 1.4 over 2 years through a behavior-based safety program, daily safety walks, and root cause analysis protocols for every near-miss report
Education
Master of Business Administration — Rutgers University, 2015 (Concentration in Operations Management. Completed while working full-time.)
Bachelor of Science in Industrial Engineering — Howard University, 2012
Skills
Operations Leadership: P&L ownership and budget management, Multi-site operations (manufacturing, logistics, distribution), Lean manufacturing and continuous improvement, Production scheduling and capacity planning, Vendor negotiation and contract management, Capital project planning and execution
People & Organizational Development: Cross-functional team leadership (280+ employees), Leadership development and succession planning, Change management, Union and non-union workforce management, Performance management and KPI frameworks
Process & Quality: Six Sigma (Black Belt), Statistical process control, Overall equipment effectiveness optimization, Root cause analysis and corrective action, ISO 9001 and GMP compliance, EHS program management
Technology & Systems: SAP ERP (MM, PP, WM modules), Oracle NetSuite, Tableau (operations dashboards), MES (manufacturing execution systems), WMS (warehouse management systems)
Certifications
Lean Six Sigma Black Belt · APICS Certified in Production and Inventory Management (CPIM) · OSHA 30-Hour General Industry
See how your resume scores against ATS systems
Check Your ATS Score Free →Why This Resume Works
P&L ownership with specific budget figures establishes executive-level credibility immediately. Stating full P&L accountability for a $94M operating budget and delivering within 1.5% of plan for 12 consecutive quarters tells a hiring executive exactly two things: Miriam controls a meaningful budget, and she controls it well. Many operations resumes describe oversight of budgets without specifying the number or demonstrating fiscal discipline. The 1.5% variance across 12 quarters, even while absorbing $3.8M in unplanned cost increases, proves she can manage financial surprises without blowing the plan. This is the kind of precision that CFOs and COOs notice.
The cost-per-unit reduction traces a multi-year improvement with a clear methodology. A 22% reduction in cost-per-unit over 3 years, achieved through lean manufacturing, vendor renegotiation, and warehouse automation, gives the reader both the outcome and the approach. Executive resumes that claim cost savings without explaining the mechanism raise more questions than they answer. By naming the levers she pulled, Miriam shows that the improvement was systematic and repeatable rather than a one-time lucky contract renegotiation. The 3-year timeframe also signals patience and follow-through, which are essential traits for operational transformation.
The leadership development program demonstrates investment in organizational capability. Promoting 8 supervisors internally, reducing external hiring costs by $340K, and achieving 94% management retention all point to someone who builds teams rather than just managing them. At the director level, individual contribution matters far less than the ability to develop and retain strong managers. This bullet distinguishes Miriam from operations directors who hit their numbers but leave behind weak bench strength. It also signals to the hiring organization that she will strengthen their leadership pipeline, not just fill a seat.
Progressive career growth through recognizable companies validates the trajectory. Moving from Operations Manager at Colgate-Palmolive to Senior Operations Manager at Henkel to Director at Church and Dwight tells a clean growth story through companies that any hiring committee will recognize. Each role shows increasing scope in headcount, budget, and facility count. This progression matters at the executive level because it demonstrates that Miriam has been vetted and promoted by organizations with rigorous talent standards, which reduces the perceived risk of hiring her into a new director-level role.
ATS Keywords for Director of Operations Resumes
ATS systems scanning Director of Operations applications look for these terms. The resume above weaves them in naturally rather than listing them outright.
Section-by-Section Writing Tips
Professional Summary
Open with your total years of experience and the industries you have operated in, then immediately state the scale of your current role: headcount, number of facilities, and budget size. Include one or two headline metrics that capture your impact, like cost-per-unit reductions or on-time delivery improvements. Close with a sentence about your operating philosophy or leadership approach, but keep it concrete rather than aspirational. At the director level, the summary should read like a brief for a board presentation, not a personal branding statement.
Experience Section
Every bullet should connect an operational action to a financial or organizational outcome. Budget figures, cost savings with dollar amounts, percentage improvements in OEE or fill rates, and headcount numbers give each achievement its proper weight. Include capital projects with their budgets and timelines, because the ability to deliver large projects on time and on budget is a core director-level competency. Name the methodologies you used (lean, Six Sigma, TPM) so ATS systems capture them and so readers understand your approach.
Skills Section
At the executive level, skills should be organized around leadership domains rather than individual tools. Lead with operations leadership and people development categories before listing process and technology skills. Include ERP and analytics platforms by name, because even directors are expected to be fluent in the systems their teams use. Certifications like CPIM, Six Sigma Black Belt, and PMP belong in a separate section but should also be reflected in the skills categories where they apply.
Education Section
An MBA or graduate degree in operations, supply chain, or engineering strengthens a director-level resume, especially at larger companies with formal executive hiring criteria. If you completed the degree while working full-time, note that - it demonstrates the discipline and time management that operations leadership requires. The undergraduate degree matters less at this level, but an engineering or industrial engineering background reinforces technical credibility for manufacturing operations roles.
Common Director of Operations Resume Mistakes
Hiring managers reviewing Director of Operations resumes flag these problems repeatedly. Each one can knock your ATS score or land your application in the rejection pile.
- Describing operations responsibilities without attaching budget figures, headcount, or facility counts, which makes it impossible for hiring executives to gauge the scale of your experience.
- Claiming cost savings or efficiency improvements without explaining the methodology or timeline, which raises skepticism about whether the results were repeatable or just circumstantial.
- Omitting people development and succession planning achievements, which are critical differentiators at the director level where building organizational capability matters as much as hitting operational targets.
- Listing lean or Six Sigma certifications without showing specific projects where those methodologies delivered measurable results in your experience section.
- Writing an overly long resume that buries key metrics in dense paragraphs instead of leading each bullet with the financial or operational outcome.
- Failing to show progressive career growth with increasing scope, which is one of the first patterns executive recruiters scan for when evaluating director-level candidates.