Master Production Planner

Role: Master Production Planner, Edinburgh

The Master Production Planner is an integral part of the operations team, reporting directly to the Head of Operations. This role is crucial for ensuring the efficient, timely, and cost-effective planning and scheduling of all production, design, and detailing activities. Additionally, it contributes to enterprise-wide program portfolio management. The Master Production Planner is responsible for both strategic planning and tactical execution of schedules, ensuring alignment with business objectives, resource optimisation, and proactive capacity planning for current and future needs. The role also involves supporting colleagues and the wider business in developing internal competency in planning and scheduling practices.

Main Duties and Responsibilities

Portfolio Plan Management:

• Develop and maintain the overall Portfolio Production plan for secured work and bid forecasts for current and long-range plan execution.
• Ensure detailed production schedules are optimally allocated to resources and adjusted proactively to accommodate changes in demand, supply issues, or equipment breakdowns.
• Conduct capacity planning for secured work and bid forecasts to ensure resources, including labor, materials, and machinery, meet both current and future production and portfolio requirements.
• Collaborate with manufacturing teams to align production activities with enterprise-level plans.
• Provide business forecast views to identify over/under capacity situations, enabling timely decisions to balance resources across the enterprise.
• Identify and mitigate risks related to production scheduling and the broader program portfolio, such as delays, supply chain disruptions, or quality issues. Develop contingency plans to address unforeseen challenges.

Portfolio Reporting:

• Ensure clear and timely communication of portfolio execution plans and schedules to all relevant stakeholders, including Production teams, Engineering, Tendering (estimating), and Senior Management.
• Establish and monitor key performance indicators (KPIs) for planning and scheduling processes.
• Analyse data to identify trends, inefficiencies, and opportunities for improvement at both production and enterprise levels. Provide detailed reports and analysis to senior management.
• Perform monthly/quarterly bridge analysis on future demand, manufacturing forecast to actual.

Planning Systems Development:

• Lead initiatives to improve and streamline planning and scheduling processes, promoting innovation and efficiency across the organization.
• Promote the use of Microsoft Project as a key planning tool, ensuring the organization adopts best practices. Support the delivery of training and provide mentoring to colleagues to strengthen internal competency in planning tools and methodologies.

Authorities, Interface, Reporting:

• Direct report to the Head of Operations.
• Interface with Project Planner (Client/Contracts Management), and department heads across Production, Quality, Procurement, Design, Engineering, and Commercial teams.
• Present status, performance, capacity, and process improvement reports to the Senior Management Team in regular reviews.

Skills, Knowledge, and Attributes:

• 5 years of experience in production planning and scheduling within a manufacturing environment, preferably in the steel industry or a project-driven environment.
• Strong understanding of manufacturing processes, resource management, and inventory control.
• Ability to plan to key milestone deliverables to meet business objectives.
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills, with the ability to foresee potential issues and proactively address them.
• Strong competency and extensive experience in Microsoft Project.
• Experience with ERP systems and advanced production planning tools. Awareness of portfolio management tools (e.g., Primavera P6) is advantageous.
• Strong leadership skills, with the ability to inspire and manage stakeholders toward continuous improvement.
• Commercially aware, with an understanding of how planning and scheduling decisions impact both production and enterprise-level outcomes.