Production Manager — Central Kitchen

3 days ago

Kyalami Gauteng, South Africa Synergy Transformation Solutions Full time

Duties & Responsibilities

Production Planning & Scheduling

  • Develop detailed daily, weekly and monthly production plans based on wholesale orders, retail demand cycles, and banqueting/event bookings.
  • Coordinate with procurement and logistics to ensure raw materials, packaging and labour are aligned to production demands.
  • Manage cooking, assembly, packaging, and dispatch timelines to avoid bottlenecks and ensure timely output.

Costing & Budget Control

  • Create and manage product costing models, including raw materials, labour hours, overheads, yield, wastage and energy usage.
  • Monitor daily production costs and compare against budgets; conduct variance analysis.
  • Implement cost-saving initiatives without compromising product quality.
  • Provide accurate costing for new product development and commercial rollouts

Production Execution & Compliance

  • Oversee all kitchen operations: cooking, batching, portioning, packaging, labelling, cold chain handling and storage.
  • Ensure all production meets quality, hygiene and safety specifications, working with the Food Safety Manager for compliance with FSSC 22000, GMP and HACCP.
  • Maintain up-to-date batch records, yield logs, traceability documents and cleaning schedules.
  • Ensure equipment is maintained and breakdowns are minimised.

Team Leadership & Staff Management

  • Lead and supervise production staff including cooks, kitchen assistants, prep teams, packers and shift supervisors.
  • Conduct daily production briefings and allocate staff to tasks based on competency and workload.
  • Provide on-the-job training on hygiene, equipment use, portioning, and production SOPs.
  • Monitor attendance, productivity, discipline and morale.

Logistics, Inventory & Dispatch

  • Ensure accurate portioning, packing, weighing and labelling of all finished goods.
  • Work with the warehouse/dispatch team to coordinate delivery schedules to retail, wholesale and banqueting venues.
  • Oversee stock rotation, FIFO, cold-chain integrity and shelf-life tracking.
  • Support procurement with inventory-level planning based on forecasted production volumes.

Continuous Improvement & Efficiency Projects

  • Identify and eliminate process inefficiencies, waste, unnecessary labour steps or quality risks.
  • Improve yields, reduce rework and enhance overall production throughput.
  • Lead capacity-planning initiatives such as equipment upgrades, new processes, or layout changes.

Reporting

  • Provide daily and monthly reports on production volume, labour usage, costs, waste, yields, downtime and delivery performance.
  • Support finance, operations and sales with accurate data for pricing, forecasts and business reviews.

Requirements:

  • Degree/Diploma in Culinary Arts, Food Technology, Food Production, Operations Management, Hospitality, or related field.
  • Additional training in production planning, operations or logistics is advantageous.
  • 10+ years experience in production management within a central kitchen, food manufacturing plant, or large-scale catering operation.
  • Proven experience managing production for retail, wholesale or banqueting.
  • Strong knowledge of costing, yield management, batch processing and cold chain operations.
  • Track record of managing medium to large production teams.
  • Experience working in or alongside FSSC 22000 / HACCP / GMP environments.

Job Type: Full-time

Work Location: In person

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