Manufacturing Systems & Planning Manager

Manufacturing Systems & Planning Manager

Location: Xico Lighting – Manufacturing Facility.

Reports to: Plant Manager.

Xico Lighting is in a rapid scale phase, with the business having doubled again this year. This role is intended for an experienced manufacturing professional who has personally owned production planning, work release, and execution systems in a growing factory environment.

The Manufacturing Systems & Planning Manager is accountable for ensuring that production is released, executed, and completed in a controlled, repeatable, and disciplined manner. This individual serves as the Plant Manager’s operational counterpart, responsible for imposing structure where informal processes no longer scale.

This is not a development or learning role. It requires sound manufacturing judgment, confidence enforcing standards, and prior experience operating at volume and complexity.

Own the systems that determine what work enters the factory, when it enters, and how it is executed—and ensure those systems hold under growth pressure.

Production Planning & Execution Ownership:

• Own and continuously improve the production planning and scheduling process.
• Translate demand into executable factory schedules based on real capacity constraints.
• Make and communicate priority decisions; manage trade-offs explicitly.
• Lead execution cadence through structured daily and weekly operating reviews.

Manufacturing Readiness & Work Release Authority:

• Act as the final authority for releasing work to production.
• Ensure all jobs meet defined readiness criteria prior to release, including:
  • Approved engineering documentation (drawings, BOMs, routings).
  • Clear and complete work instructions.
  • Engineering change control fully applied.
  • Materials verified, kitted, and staged.
• Prevent incomplete, ambiguous, or changing work from entering production.

Documentation, Standards & Control:

• Establish and enforce standards for:
  • Work packets and travelers.
  • Assembly and inspection instructions.
  • Revision and change management.
• Eliminate reliance on tribal knowledge by institutionalizing best practices.

Cross-Functional Execution Leadership:

• Serve as the execution interface between:
  • Manufacturing Engineering.
  • Quality Engineering.
  • Materials Planning & Purchasing.
  • Customer Support/Commercial teams.
• Ensure changes, exceptions, and expedites are formally controlled and communicated.

Performance Visibility & Continuous Improvement:

• Track and report execution metrics including:
  • On-time delivery and schedule adherence.
  • WIP aging and throughput constraints.
  • Rework and execution failure modes.
• Identify systemic breakdowns and drive practical corrective actions.
• Scale planning and execution systems to support continued growth.

What This Role Is Explicitly Not:

• Not a junior planning or scheduling role.
• Not a floor supervision or shift management position.
• Not a training or rotational assignment.

This role requires independent ownership and seasoned manufacturing judgment from day one.

• 7+ years in manufacturing operations, production planning, or manufacturing engineering.
• Direct experience owning work release to production.
• Background in a high-mix, engineered product environment.
• Demonstrated success supporting assembly operations under growth conditions.

• Proven ability to build and enforce manufacturing systems.
• Strong command of documentation, change control, and execution discipline.
• Comfortable pushing back when work is not ready.
• Able to operate independently with minimal supervision.

• Seen as a peer by engineering, quality, and operations leaders.
• Calm, decisive, and structured under pressure.
• Motivated by building order, predictability, and accountability.