Planning Specialist

The Planning Specialist role involves inventory planning, production planning, forecasting, customer service, and purchasing activities.

In this role, you will plan and control inventory to meet the company's sales and distribution demand. This includes analyzing inventory levels, inventory positioning, planned production and sales forecasts.

Responsibilities include:

• Developing production plans for Molding, Stamping, and Hand Pack departments, based on customer requirements.
• Optimizing and forecasting inventory levels of raw materials, work-in-progress, and finished goods.
• Using SAP, create production orders, process material movement transactions, and reconcile discrepancies.
• Responsible for traffic/warehouse activities, including in/outbound trucking, international export, and intercompany transfer.
• Extensive interaction with customer purchasing and scheduling departments.

In addition to the Planning Specialist duties, this position will also include purchasing responsibilities:

• Procurement of raw materials to support the Molding, Stamping, and Hand Pack departments
• Management of raw material delivery schedules to meet production demand while maximizing inventory turns.
• This position will be involved with material contract negotiations, supported by global Commodity Business Managers.
• Annual vendor performance ratings
• Various purchasing reporting activities
• Resolution of pricing discrepancies and accounts payable issues.

• Bachelor's degree with a minimum of 5 years of related experience in high-volume manufacturing production planning or purchasing. Decisions have long-lasting effects and influence organizational performance.
• Proven experience in planning and scheduling is required.
• Demonstrated project management skills.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills.
• Self-motivated, well-organized, flexible, and detail-oriented. Ability to prioritize and meet deadlines with a high degree of professionalism.
• Ability to work effectively with diverse cultures.
• Experience with SAP preferred; other relevant ERP systems will be considered.
• Experience with Ariba would be a plus.