Production Planning & Control Manager

Position Overview

The Production Planning & Control Manager owns the production schedule and controls the release of work into the shop across sheet metal fabrication, extrusion, CNC machining, and assembly operations. This role determines what gets built, in what order, and when it starts, and keeps that plan current as material availability, capacity, labor, and customer requirements change.

The position serves as the central coordinator of production flow, working closely with the Shop Manager, department leaders, Purchasing, Engineering, and other functions to ensure the production plan is realistic, executable, and clearly communicated.

The Production Planning & Control Manager does not directly supervise production personnel. Instead, the role is responsible for establishing and maintaining the production plan, identifying constraints before they disrupt production, and coordinating across departments to keep customer commitments on track.

Core Responsibilities

Production Planning & Scheduling

• Own and maintain the master production schedule across all production lines and departments.
• Control the release of work into production and manage work-in-process to a level the shop can reasonably complete.
• Set build sequence and coordinate sequencing decisions with the Shop Manager and department leaders.
• Receive customer schedule requirements and translate them into an achievable internal production plan.
• Adjust the production plan as material availability, labor, capacity, engineering requirements, and customer priorities change.
• Balance near-term customer requirements against available production capacity and existing commitments.
• Maintain clear priorities so production personnel and department leaders understand what work should be completed next.

Capacity & Production Flow

• Evaluate available capacity across sheet metal, extrusion, CNC machining, and assembly when developing and adjusting the production schedule.
• Identify bottlenecks, overloaded work centers, and capacity constraints before they affect customer delivery.
• Coordinate with the Shop Manager and department leaders on labor and resource constraints that may prevent execution of the schedule.
• Monitor work-in-process and avoid releasing excessive work ahead of constrained operations.
• Use cycle time, historical production performance, and actual shop conditions to continuously improve planning accuracy.
• Help balance workloads across departments to maintain consistent production flow and minimize unnecessary starts, stops, and expediting.

Material & Production Readiness

• Work closely with Purchasing to align raw material, purchased parts, and component availability with scheduled production start dates.
• Identify material shortages and other readiness issues far enough in advance to allow corrective action.
• Coordinate with Engineering to identify missing drawings, incomplete information, engineering changes, or other technical issues that could prevent scheduled work from proceeding.
• Ensure major production-readiness concerns are visible before work is released to the shop.

Cross-Functional Coordination

• Serve as a central coordination point between Production, Purchasing, Engineering, Sales/Customer Service, and management.
• Communicate production priorities, schedule changes, constraints, and emerging delivery risks to the appropriate departments.
• Facilitate decisions when competing priorities, capacity limitations, or material constraints require changes to the production plan.
• Provide realistic production information to support customer delivery commitments and internal decision-making.
• Coordinate directly with customers when necessary regarding schedules, priorities, and production timing.

Production Visibility & Reporting

• Maintain accurate visibility of production status, work-in-process, and upcoming priorities.
• Track schedule adherence and identify significant gaps between planned and actual production.
• Report emerging delays, capacity constraints, and material risks to management.
• Develop and maintain reporting that allows management to understand production status without relying solely on walking the shop floor.
• Use production data to identify recurring scheduling problems and opportunities to improve planning accuracy.

Process Improvement

• Identify inefficiencies in production flow, scheduling, work release, and coordination between departments.
• Improve production planning methods using actual capacity, cycle-time, and performance data.
• Support improvements to routings, job sequencing, production reporting, and other systems that affect the reliability of the production plan.
• Reduce dependence on last-minute expediting and reactive scheduling by improving the quality and visibility of production information.
• Promote consistent production planning and control practices throughout the organization.

What Success Looks Like

• The production schedule is current, realistic, trusted, and used by the shop.
• Customer requirements are translated into clear and achievable production priorities.
• Work-in-process remains at a manageable level rather than accumulating ahead of production constraints.
• Capacity problems are identified early enough to adjust the plan rather than becoming last-minute emergencies.
• Material and production-readiness risks are identified against the schedule before they stop a production line.
• Production departments have clear priorities and fewer conflicting instructions.
• Last-minute schedule changes, scrambles, and expedites are reduced.
• Schedule adherence and on-time delivery improve.
• Production status and emerging risks are readily available to management without requiring constant manual follow-up.
• Purchasing, Engineering, Production, and customer-facing functions operate from a common understanding of the production plan.

Qualifications

• PMP certification required.
• Experience in production planning, scheduling, production control, or manufacturing operations.
• Experience working in a multi-department manufacturing environment; fabrication, machining, and assembly experience preferred.
• Strong working understanding of capacity planning, cycle time, production routing, bottleneck management, and work-in-process control.
• Comfortable working extensively in an ERP/MRP system and Microsoft Excel.
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills with the ability to use production data to make practical scheduling decisions.
• Ability to establish and maintain a production plan while coordinating across departments without direct authority over production personnel.
• Able to balance customer requirements, production realities, and competing organizational priorities.
• Clear, direct communicator who is comfortable working with shop personnel, department leaders, management, and customers.
• Highly organized and capable of managing changing priorities in a fast-paced, low-volume/high-variation manufacturing environment.

Position Impact

The Production Planning & Control Manager provides the structure and coordination necessary to keep multiple production departments working toward a common plan. By controlling work release, maintaining realistic schedules, anticipating constraints, and improving visibility across the organization, this role is directly responsible for creating a more predictable production environment and improving the company's ability to meet customer commitments.