Demand & Materials Planning Manager

Demand & Materials Planning Manager Position Purpose: The Demand & Materials Planning Manager leads demand planning and raw-material forecasting across multiple manufacturing locations. This role translates customer demand, production schedules, historical usage, inventory levels, supplier lead times, and business forecasts into actionable purchasing and material plans that support uninterrupted production while optimizing inventory investment. The ideal candidate has significant experience leading multi-site demand planning in a manufacturing environment, strong ERP/MRP capabilities, and a practical understanding of purchasing and inventory management. Metals purchasing experience is preferred, along with familiarity with CNC machining and the impact of material grades, dimensions, yields, scrap, and lead times on production requirements. Essential Functions: Demand Planning and Raw-Material Forecasting: Lead the demand-planning process across multiple manufacturing locations and establish consistent planning methods, reporting, and performance expectations. Develop and maintain raw-material forecasts using customer demand, production schedules, historical consumption, inventory balances, supplier lead times, and anticipated business requirements. Translate finished-goods demand and production plans into projected raw-material requirements by site, material type, specification, and timing. Analyze forecast-to-actual consumption, identify root causes of variance, and implement actions to improve planning accuracy. Identify anticipated shortages, excess inventory, changing demand, and material risks and communicate them proactively to Purchasing, Operations, and site leadership. Establish planning horizons and replenishment assumptions that reflect supplier lead times, production requirements, service expectations, and inventory objectives. Support capacity and production-planning decisions by providing accurate and timely material-demand projections. Purchasing and Materials Management: Partner with Purchasing to convert forecasts and ERP/MRP requirements into effective raw-material purchasing plans. Monitor raw-material availability, supplier lead times, open purchase orders, inventory levels, safety stock, reorder points, and anticipated production needs. Support purchasing strategies for metals, alloys, forgings, castings, bar stock, billet, plate, and other manufacturing materials, as applicable. Recommend appropriate order quantities and replenishment strategies while balancing production continuity, inventory carrying cost, minimum order quantities, and supplier constraints. Identify potential supply constraints and develop mitigation recommendations, including alternate timing, inventory transfers, supplier escalation, or approved material substitutions. Analyze slow-moving, excess, and obsolete raw-material inventory and recommend disposition or consumption plans. Consolidate demand across sites when appropriate to improve purchasing leverage, inventory utilization, and supplier planning. ERP/MRP Systems and Data Management: Use ERP/MRP systems to manage demand signals, material requirements, lead times, order policies, safety stock, purchase requirements, and planning parameters. Review system-generated recommendations and convert them into practical purchasing and material-planning actions. Maintain accurate planning master data and partner with Purchasing, Operations, Engineering, and IT to resolve data-integrity issues. Develop and maintain reports and dashboards that track forecast accuracy, inventory levels, material availability, shortages, purchase requirements, and excess inventory. Use advanced Excel and analytical tools to assess trends, model demand scenarios, and support fact-based decisions. Lead continuous improvement efforts related to ERP/MRP utilization, planning disciplines, data accuracy, and material visibility. Manufacturing and CNC Support: Partner with Operations, Production Planning, Engineerin…

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