Production Planner

Company Description

Douglas Manufacturing, founded in 1978, is a pioneering leader in the conveyor industry committed to enhancing the safety and profitability of conveyor systems. As part of the Rulmeca Group, Douglas is one of 18 global manufacturing and sales companies, serving customers in over 85 countries. With a team of more than 1,200 dedicated professionals, Douglas offers a wide range of products, from stock pulleys and idlers to custom-engineered conveying solutions. The company operates with a focus on "Conveying Innovation" to address the diverse need of its customers.

Position Summary

The Production Planner / Scheduler plays a key role in helping the company meet customer commitments by creating, maintaining, and communicating a clear and executable production schedule. This position serves as a central coordination point between Procurement, Production, Engineering, Customer Service, Shipping, and Plant Leadership to support material readiness, production flow, schedule accuracy, and on-time delivery.

This is an on-site, hands-on production control role for someone who enjoys solving problems, organizing priorities, working with multiple departments, and helping a manufacturing team execute successfully. The ideal candidate will be detail-oriented, proactive, comfortable working in ERP systems, and able to communicate clearly in a fast-paced production environment.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities

The Production Planner / Scheduler is responsible for supporting safe, efficient, high-quality, and on-time production by performing the following duties:

• Develop, maintain, and communicate daily and weekly production schedules based on customer orders, material availability, labor, capacity, and shipment requirements.
• Review incoming sales orders for production readiness, including required dates, product details, material needs, engineering requirements, and potential scheduling concerns.
• Monitor open orders, production orders, late orders, priority orders, and upcoming ship dates to help maintain clear production visibility.
• Work closely with the Procurement and Production Scheduling Manager to identify material shortages, purchasing issues, inventory concerns, or supplier delays that may affect production.
• Coordinate with Production, Engineering, Customer Service, Shipping, Procurement, and Plant Leadership to help resolve schedule conflicts and keep orders moving.
• Confirm material readiness before orders are prioritized or scheduled for production.
• Communicate schedule changes, production delays, material issues, and order status updates in a timely and professional manner.
• Participate in production meetings as needed to review schedule priorities, material readiness, late orders, and production constraints.
• Maintain accurate production reports, backlog reports, schedule trackers, priority order lists, and other required planning documents.
• Use ERP system data, production feedback, and material availability information to support scheduling decisions.
• Identify production bottlenecks, recurring scheduling issues, capacity constraints, and process gaps.
• Recommend improvements that support better schedule accuracy, production flow, material readiness, and communication.
• Maintain confidentiality and exercise sound judgment when working with customer orders, production information, schedules, costs, and internal business matters.
• Support a safe, clean, organized, and productive work environment.
• Follow company policies, procedures, and standards consistently and professionally.
• Perform additional duties as needed to support production, customer service, and overall business performance.

ERP / Microsoft Dynamics 365

Experience with Microsoft Dynamics 365 or a similar ERP system is preferred. The successful candidate should be comfortable using ERP data to review sales orders, production orders, inventory availability, material requirements, and production status to support accurate scheduling and reporting.

Qualifications

Required qualifications include:

• Prior experience in production scheduling, production planning, production control, manufacturing coordination, purchasing support, customer service support, or a related manufacturing role.
• Strong understanding of production flow, material readiness, order prioritization, lead times, capacity constraints, and on-time delivery requirements.
• Proficiency with Microsoft Excel, Word, Outlook, and other Microsoft Office programs.
• Ability to learn and effectively use ERP, scheduling, reporting, and production management systems.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills.
• Strong organizational skills and attention to detail.
• Ability to manage multiple priorities in a fast-paced manufacturing environment.
• Ability to identify potential problems early and communicate them professionally.
• Ability to work effectively with production supervisors, team leaders, customer service, procurement, engineering, shipping, and management.
• Strong work ethic, dependable attendance, positive attitude, and commitment to teamwork.
• Ability to maintain confidentiality and exercise good judgment.

Preferred qualifications include:

• Experience with Microsoft Dynamics 365 or similar ERP systems.
• Experience in manufacturing, fabricated metal products, conveyor components, industrial equipment, or engineered-to-order products.
• Experience with production orders, bills of material, routings, work centers, inventory availability, and work order scheduling.
• Experience supporting make-to-order and make-to-stock production environments.
• Strong Excel skills, including filters, formulas, pivot tables, and production reporting tools.

Key Competencies

Successful performance in this role requires strong planning, organization, communication, follow-through, attention to detail, problem solving, ERP discipline, teamwork, and the ability to work with urgency in a changing manufacturing environment.

Success in This Role

Success in this position will be measured by the employee’s ability to help improve production visibility, schedule accuracy, order readiness, and communication between departments. Key success factors include timely production schedules, early identification of material or capacity issues, accurate reporting, improved schedule discipline, and strong support of on-time delivery performance.