ABOUT THE COMPANY

The VP Human Resources is a new position for this multi-state, family-owned process manufacturing company in Toledo, Ohio. They have a strong national footprint and a reputation for quality, stability, and disciplined growth. The company combines deep operational expertise with a values-driven culture and is in an exciting phase of expansion and organizational evolution.

This search is being conducted confidentially at this time. Additional details will be shared with qualified candidates during the search process.

THE OPPORTUNITY 

• Partner directly with the CEO and leadership team to shape the future of a values-driven organization entering its next chapter of growth.
• Design and build a scalable leadership and organizational structure that preserves the company’s culture while strengthening enterprise capability.
• Serve as the trusted authority on employment law and people risk, protecting the business while enabling confident, responsible expansion.
• Elevate the Senior Executive Team’s effectiveness, strengthening alignment, accountability, and succession readiness across generations of leadership.
• Leave a lasting legacy by building the people systems, leadership bench, and cultural foundation that will sustain the company for decades to come.

WHAT YOU’LL BE DOING

The VP HR will shape and scale the organization’s people strategy to ensure its structure, leadership capability, and culture align with ambitious business objectives. This is a hands-on, high-impact executive position requiring strong employment law and labor relations expertise, organizational design mastery, and the ability to influence and strengthen senior leadership dynamics. You will be a trusted advisor to the CEO and Senior Executive Team, providing candid counsel, mitigating people and legal risk, and ensuring the organization’s leadership infrastructure is built to scale. Your leadership will help to build an organization that grows responsibly, leads effectively, and sustains long-term enterprise health. 

Executive Leadership & Enterprise Advisory

• Serve as a trusted strategic advisor on organizational design, leadership effectiveness, employment risk, and workforce strategy.
• Coach senior executives individually and collectively to elevate enterprise-level leadership behaviors and decision-making.
• Facilitate alignment, accountability, and collaboration across the executive team.
• Provide data-informed, candid counsel—constructively challenging when necessary to protect long-term organizational health. 

Organizational Design & Workforce Strategy

• Lead the design and evolution of scalable organizational structures aligned to growth strategy.
• Clarify executive roles, decision rights, spans of control, and accountability frameworks.
• Identify and resolve structural friction, duplication, and cross-functional misalignment.
• Drive enterprise workforce planning and succession strategies that anticipate future capability needs. 

Employment Law & Risk Leadership

• Serve as the organization’s primary internal authority on employment law, labor relations, and people-related risk with a union and non-union workforce.
• Proactively advise leadership on legal implications of organizational changes, employee relations matters, and growth initiatives.
• Ensure HR policies, systems, and practices are compliant, consistent, and defensible.
• Partner effectively with external legal counsel while maintaining strong internal ownership of employment risk management. 

Executive & Leadership Development

• Design and implement leadership development strategies aligned to enterprise growth.
• Identify leadership capability gaps and proactively mitigate succession risks.
• Ensure performance management systems reinforce accountability, collaboration, and desired leadership behaviors.
• Develop high-potential leaders and strengthen the executive succession bench.

 Culture, Change & HR Function Leadership

• Lead a multi-location HR team to champion a cohesive leadership culture during periods of rapid growth, transformation, or acquisition.
• Embed company values into leadership expectations, decision-making, and performance systems.
• Lead change management efforts tied to restructuring, expansion, or strategic initiatives.
• Build and lead a high-performing HR function with scalable systems, metrics, and infrastructure aligned to business strategy.

IDEAL BACKROUND AND EXPERIENCE:

• Bachelor’s degree in Business, Human Resources, or related field required.
• Advanced understanding of federal and state employment regulations required; JD, MBA preferred.
• 15+ years of progressive HR leadership experience, including at least 5 years at the VP level (or equivalent) within a growth-oriented or scaling organization.
• Experience must include labor and employee relations with a union workforce.
• Demonstrated success leading enterprise-wide organizational design, restructuring, and transformation initiatives.
• Deep, applied expertise in employment law, employee relations, compliance, compensation, and enterprise risk mitigation.
• Proven ability to coach, influence, and constructively challenge senior executives and leadership teams.
• Experience supporting multi-division, geographically dispersed, and operationally complex environments.
• Executive presence with the ability to influence outcomes through credibility, insight, and trust rather than positional authority.
• Strong business acumen with the capability to translate legal, organizational, and people strategies into measurable business impact.
• High emotional intelligence, discretion, and sound judgment in managing sensitive and high stakes matters.
• Analytical and data-driven mindset with strong facilitation, communication, and conflict-resolution capabilities to inform executive decision-making.

KEY PERSONAL ATTRIBUTES

• Executive presence with the credibility to influence senior leaders and the Board.
• Strong business acumen with the ability to translate legal and people matters into measurable business impact.
• Courage to challenge constructively and advocate for long-term enterprise health.
• High emotional intelligence, discretion, and sound judgment in sensitive situations.
• An enterprise leader who is equally comfortable shaping strategy and engaging in operational execution.
• Enterprise mindset focused on scalable systems, structural clarity, and leadership accountability.
• Collaborative yet decisive; pragmatic yet strategic.
• Comfortable operating in ambiguity and leading through rapid growth and change.

THE PAYOFF

• Shape the organizational architecture and leadership capability of a high-growth enterprise.
• Collaborate with the CEO and Senior Executive Team on decisions that define the company’s future.
• Build a scalable HR infrastructure that reduces risk while enabling growth.
• Strengthen executive effectiveness and succession readiness across the organization.
• Leave a lasting legacy by ensuring the company’s culture, structure, and leadership capacity evolve in alignment with long-term strategy.