Materials Manager

Materials Manager

Location:

Marietta, OH
Duration:
Full time, Direct Hire
Salary:
Starting at $95,000 annually, with potential for a higher salary based on experience.

Travel Required:

Up to 20% (supplier visits, strategic sourcing reviews, supply chain conferences)

The Materials Manager is the on-site supply chain leader for the power distribution assembly operation, responsible for ensuring that the right materials are available at the right time to support every active project — from configure-to-order quick-ship programs through complex, long-horizon engineered-to-order builds. This is a hands-on leadership role with direct supervisory responsibility for the Buyer Planner team and a mandate to operate at both the tactical and strategic levels of supply chain management simultaneously.

At the tactical level, the Materials Manager owns the day-to-day performance of material availability, inventory health, and supplier delivery compliance across the facility. At the strategic level, the Materials Manager partners with the Director of Supply Chain to position strategic materials, develop supply chain resilience for critical commodities, and drive inventory investment decisions that balance working capital efficiency against production continuity.

The Materials Manager is the critical integration point between supply chain and operations — working daily with Project Managers to align material plans to project schedules, engaging Sales early on new opportunities to provide realistic lead time input and collaborating with Production to ensure the shop floor never stops for a preventable material shortage. This role requires both the technical depth to understand MRP/ERP-driven planning and the leadership credibility to hold a team and a supplier base accountable to high performance standards.

The Materials Manager operates at the center of a cross-functional network. Key relationships and the nature of each interface are defined below:

• Director of Supply Chain
  - Dotted-line strategic alignment — category strategy, supplier positioning, make/buy decisions, and capital inventory investment
• Buyer Planners (direct) - Day-to-day supervision of purchasing and planning execution; performance management; workload balancing across project portfolio
• Project Managers (peer) - Collaboration to ensure material plans align to project schedules; joint escalation on supply risk and delivery risk
• Sales (peer) - Early engagement on new opportunities; material lead time input for order acknowledgement; demand visibilityc
• Production / Operations
  - Material availability to support assembly schedules; shortage resolution; dock-to-floor coordination
• Quality Engineering (peer) - Supplier qualification, NCM disposition, SCAR process, and incoming inspection coordination

• Directly supervise, coach, and develop the Buyer Planner team; set clear performance expectations, conduct regular 1:1s, and deliver structured performance reviews against defined KPIs.
• Assign and balance workload across Buyer Planners by commodity, project type, and volume; adjust portfolio assignments as business needs and team capability evolve.
• Ensure Buyer Planners are operating as disciplined ERP/MRP power users — executing all procurement and planning actions through the system, maintaining item master data accuracy, and acting on exception messages with urgency and precision.
• Monitor Buyer Planner performance against the 10 inventory turns per year target at the individual portfolio level and in aggregate; coach underperforming planners and elevate persistent gaps to operations leadership.
• Develop team capability through structured mentoring, cross-training, and exposure to supplier negotiations, commodity strategy, and project-level material planning.
• Identify and close skills gaps within the team; support training and certification pursuits (APICS CPIM, CSCP) as part of individual development plans.
• Maintain coverage plans for team absences; ensure no project or supplier relationship goes unmanaged during vacations, leaves, or turnover.