Director, Production & Planning

Director, Production & Planning

Combining masterful artistry and storytelling with groundbreaking technology, Walt Disney Animation Studios is a filmmaker-driven animation studio responsible for creating some of the most beloved films ever made, including Frozen, Zootopia, and Moana. For over 100 years, Disney Animation has told timeless stories set in imaginative worlds, with compelling characters. We invite you to bring your unique talents, passion, and ideas to our collaborative team.

The Director, Production & Planning supports the VP, Production & Planning in strategically planning feature films and other projects that are simultaneously being produced within the studio, and to explore alternate production and slate scenarios. This position is responsible for the overall utilization of historical data to: inform current and future planning, highlight areas to review regarding complexity, efficiency, and budget, and identify recommendations for improvement.

This position also manages the evolution and maintenance of production plan templates for the studio, requiring deep collaboration with Studio, Departmental, and Production Leadership, and oversees a team that develops dashboards, reports, and tools to drive production analysis and inform strategy and decision-making at WDAS.

• Manage Studio’s production plan templates for features, specials, and shorts projects. Update as necessary, prepare scenario analysis, and assess studio impacts in collaboration with Studio leadership.
• Create initial production plans and resource schedules for projects that do not yet have an Associate Producer assigned to them, working with Development to incorporate the development timeline into the overall production plan. Work collaboratively with Finance to translate these early show plans into budgets.
• Create and consolidate production scenarios to provide recommendations on how best to optimize studio resources, minimize production risks, and provide options for slate planning based on studio, financial, and creative goals.
• Use data from past projects to generate production dashboards, reports, and presentations to highlight areas for reviewing complexity, efficiency, and budgets, informing decision making and future planning.
• Act as a thought partner and provide recommendations to Associate Producers on inventory flow strategies, challenges, and opportunities.
• Partner with Production leadership to create consistent production milestones and dashboards to improve cross-show consistency in data tracking and reporting.
• Partner with Production Finance to realize financial impacts at both the production and studio levels that are driven by production planning assumptions.
• Manage a team that owns and supports the production tracking tool (Autodesk Flow Production Tracking) and generates meaningful and consistent dashboards to provide the basis for analysis and inform recommendations for future projects.
• Own, manage, and support workforce planning tools and generate dashboards related to resource planning for the studio, enhancing the studio’s production planning and workforce planning capabilities.
• Partner closely with Technology leaders to help prioritize initiatives for future process improvement tools and guide the development of such tools.
• Keep up to date with industry trends and explore how new technologies could improve or disrupt existing established methodologies for production scheduling, data management, and visualization.
• Serve as a key stakeholder in, and partner with, the Data Team in efforts to create trend analysis, and predictive production and workforce forecasts.

• 10+ years of production experience.
• 5+ years of production leadership experience, including as an Associate Producer.
• Specialized knowledge of the production process in animation, deep understanding of animation workflows, and management of production environments.
• Strong leadership, communication, time management, and critical thinking skills.
• High aptitude for strategic planning and tactical execution on multiple simultaneous projects.
• Demonstrated ability to identify and track priorities.
• Effective…