Lexington Supply Chain Planner

The Supply Chain MASTER Planner is responsible for the end-to-end planning, scheduling, and execution of production orders to meet customer demand while optimizing plant capacity, inventory and on time delivery performance.  Reporting to the Supply Chain Manager, this role serves as the central coordinator between Operations, Engineering, Quality, Customer Care, Sales, and Distribution, ensuring accurate planning, efficient execution, and continuous improvement across multiple value streams.  This position is also an SAP Planning Super User, managing complex production orders, inventory flows, pegging, rework/remake orders and system integrity. 

Key Responsibilities

Production Planning & Scheduling

• Create, convert, manage, and close planned and production orders in SAP, including documentation, notes, and special requirements.
• Develop and maintain an executable master production schedule aligned with capacity, material availability and customer requirements. 
• Assign ship dates, production due dates, and first goods inventory dates, accounting for lead times and pick-pack requirements.
• Level load plant production based on forecast, backlog, and operational constraints.
• Monitor plant loading versus forecast and adjust schedules as needed.
• Attend daily / weekly planning, production, and operation meetings to provide updates and implement changes.

Inventory & Materials Management

• Manage movement and disposition of WIP, semifinished, and finished goods in accordance with ERP rules.
• Maintain inventory accuracy in SAP, including stock categories, blocks, holds and reclassifications.
• Identify, analyze, and resolve inventory discrepancies through root cause analysis. 
• Perform stock searches to utilize existing inventory, fallout, or rework opportunities to fulfill new orders.
• Identify material substitutions to sell stock in place of new production when appropriate.

Order Management & Customer Coordination

• Coordinate with Customer Care Representatives (CCR) to approve, schedule and modify new and existing sales orders. 
• Schedule dates based on product specifications, DNSE requirements, capacity, material availability and risk assessment.
• Convert planned orders to production orders in advance of the production month.
• Coordinate sales order changes, part number changes, and fiber /class reclassifications as needed.
• Communication schedule changes, delays, or manufacturing issues that may impact customer delivery.

Quality, QN & Rework Management

• Participate in daily Materials Review Board (MRB) meetings.
• Manage Quality Notification (QN) planning tasks through disposition.
• Create and manage rework and remake orders; reschedule associated sales orders.
• Evaluate short orders and fallouts, support scrap decisions and process waivers.
• Coordinate with Quality to determine when to submit length waivers to customers.
• Identify and document opportunities to rework or repurpose existing inventory.

Engineering & Change Management

• Create, confirm, and issue Engineering Orders.
• Coordinate and implement fiber, routing, BOM and design changes.
• Revise production orders for routing and material changes.
• Support sample, test, and TPA-related orders with Commercial and Engineering teams.

SAP User & Systems Support

• Serve as SAP Super User for Planning functions.
• Perform back-end SAP updates (dates, blocks, pegging, master data changes).
• Ensure system data integrity for planning, inventory, and reporting.

Reporting & Analysis

• Prepare and distribute daily and monthly production and backlog reports.
• Analyze backlog, product mix, capacity utilization and changeover impacts.
• Perform lead-time analysis and provide recommendations to stakeholders.
• Support KPI performance for one-time delivery, throughput, and inventory health.

Cross-Functional Collaboration

• Support continuous improvement initiatives including Lean, Kaizen and value stream optimization.
• Work closely with Operations, Engineering, Quality, Supply Chain, Sales, Finance, IT, Procurement and Distribution.

Skills and Qualifications

Required:

• Bachelor’s degree.
• Minimum 3-5 years of experience in production planning, supply chain, warehousing, manufacturing, or related field.
• Experience with ERP systems (SAP; Cable Solutions wire and cable industry module a plus).
• Advanced SAP planning and master data skills.
• Strong analytical, data-driven problem-solving abilities.
• Able to think strategically and about the “bigger picture”
• Advanced Microsoft excel and Microsoft office proficiency.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills.
• Ability to manage priorities in a fast-paced environment with limited supervision. 

Preferred:

• Knowledge of lean manufacturing, Kaizen, and value stream management.