Planning & Scheduling Team Leader

Summary

The Planning & Scheduling Team Leader is responsible to deliver and lead the Sales and Operations Planning (S&OP) process for the Company. Additionally, this role provides leadership over the Production Planning & Scheduling Team. This role is accountable for all aspects of department performance including Safety & Environment, Quality, Reliability, Production, and Productivity.

Essential Functions

• Lead and own the end‑to‑end S&OP process across near-, mid-, and long‑term horizons (0–36 months) to balance demand, capacity, inventory, and operational constraints. Communicate production plans, risks, and tradeoffs clearly to enable timely decision‑making and operational alignment.
• Provide functional leadership for production planning and scheduling (0–4 weeks), translating executable, capacity‑leveled schedules into SAP process orders and governing schedule adherence.
• Establish and govern inventory and cycle count strategy, approvals, and root cause closure to reduce financial and operational risk.
• Define, track, and improve team KPIs, translating performance data into actionable improvement plans and leadership‑level summaries.
• Lead, develop, and manage the Planning & Scheduling team, including staffing, onboarding, capability development, workload balancing, succession planning, and performance management.
• Champion continuous improvement of processes, tools, documentation, and SAP utilization (including IBP/Production Planning module evaluations), while ensuring compliance with internal controls and audit requirements.
• Lead cross-functional end of quarter creative initiatives to meet finance and sales plan.
• Create, maintain, and enhance work processes and tools to effectively operate. Delegate ownership of them as appropriate.

Additional Duties/Responsibilities

• Represent team for ISO and IATF audits as well as provide team with support during cycle count audits.
• Accountable for monthly reconciliation of production recording and inventory accuracy across production areas.
• Establish Team priorities and adjust as necessary.
• Develop backup strategy for roles within the Team.
• Primary backup for Supply & Logistics Manager. Secondary backup for Production Planner roles within the Team.

Skills

• Supply Chain management, business acumen, and cross-functional expertise.
• Strong communication skills across all levels of the organization. This includes oral, verbal, written, and presentation skills.
• Working knowledge of SAP Material and Production Master Data (Production Versions, BOMs, Recipes) as well as Material Management, Cycle Counting, and Contract Manufacturing/Refurbishment workflows desired.
• Understanding of/willingness to quickly learn the IT owned tools necessary to support.
• Company operations (SAP, ECS, CM-MES, Material Picker, Run Conditions, Run Harvest, TA Scheduler, Product Spec, ETMS, SigmaFine, Sample Manager).
• Fluent in analytical tools (Spotfire, Excel PivotTables, SAP data extraction, general data analysis).

Behaviors

• A strong sense of obligation to coach and develop the members of the Team.
• Be comfortable with vague and/or not completely defined work. Have the initiative to take that information and work independently to create tangible results.
• Cause and effect thinking.
• Positive, can-do, and professional attitude.
• Free flowing sharing of information.
• Service oriented mindset for both internal and external customers/suppliers.
• A propensity for documentation, procedural discipline, data-based decisions, and adherence to business processes.
• Core Competencies: collaborates, self-awareness, develops talent, drives engagement, drives results, instills trust.

Required Work Experience

• A minimum of 2+ years in related work experience (such as scheduling, planning, logistics, and inventory management).
• A minimum of 5+ years in the manufacturing industry.

Environment/Working Conditions

• Environment is often fast paced, with business requirements causing frequent interruptions and changing priorities.

Minimum Required Education/Certification

• Bachelor’s degree in supply chain, engineering, or business is the minimum educational requirements for this role. Other science and critical thinking degrees can be considered provided minimum work experience indicated above is met.
• APICS certification preferred.
• Six Sigma Green Belt or Black Belt certification preferred.