About Kiwicare

Kiwicare Holdings is proudly a New Zealand owned and operated organisation with offices in Auckland, Christchurch and Brisbane. We offer product solutions that help people become heroes in their homes, gardens and communities. We have well-known leading FMCG consumer brands and products across garden, pest, homewares, camping and cleaning products distributed by our experienced team through major and individual retail outlets, government, landowners and professional operators throughout New Zealand & Australia.  

We are a passionate and accountable team and strive to foster a collaborative environment where our people can deliver exceptional outcomes. We refer to this as PACE and this represents not only our values, but also the agility with which we perform at our best. Our PACE values embody our culture and speak to what it’s like to work at Kiwicare.

We support the protection of the environment and a greater natural biodiversity in New Zealand and elsewhere. We have a track record in bringing innovative products to market that is underpinned by our Research and Development capabilities and a commitment to our innovation culture of “clever, better, different”. Purpose-built manufacturing facilities in Christchurch and a large-scale distribution warehouse in Auckland enable us to have complete oversight of our products from conception through to their arrival on retailers' shelves; this means that we can maintain an extremely high level of quality and consumer satisfaction over our products. 

Position Summary

We are looking for a BCom Operations Management (or similar) graduate to join us as a Production Scheduler/Analyst to provide support to the Operations Team in the areas of production planning & scheduling, inventory control, and operations performance reporting. The Production Scheduler/Analyst role will be a key position within the Operations Team with the primary purpose to determine and set daily, weekly, and monthly manufacturing schedules for all business units to meet forecast customer demand and maintain a consistently high customer service level.

The Production Scheduler/Analyst achieves this by examining customer orders, available inventory, available staff, and machine capacities to effectively set and manage production schedules. In addition, the Production Scheduler/Analyst will also closely monitor manufacturing performance and actively adjust schedules in response to equipment failures or resource/ supply shortages. 

This role will also provide administrative support to the Integrated Business Planning Manager, and work as part of the Operations Team in achieving Kiwicare’s strategy and goals.

Key Accountabilities

• Correlate planning and scheduling of work orders with machine loading and labour availability to obtain optimum utilisation of equipment, efficient allocation of labour, and on-time delivery of products.
• Continuously review finished inventory status and schedule production to ensure that stock levels are maintained to the inventory holding policy.
• Ensure adherence to the ‘Daily Production Scheduling Standard Process’ timings for all business units and Contract Manufacturing jobs.
• Work pro-actively, with the Production Manager, Team Leaders, Purchasing Officer, and Integrated Business Planning Manager to ensure we maximise plan attainment percentage.
• Coordinate with Production, Purchasing, and Finance teams to develop and maintain scheduling parameters
• Seek to identify and implement continuous improvement initiatives on all things related to Production Scheduling.
• Work with the Production Manager, Team leaders, Purchasing Officer, and Integrated Business Planning Manager to execute and implement Operations wide continuous improvement initiatives.
• Analyse and address production issues in a timely fashion.
• Prepare production and scheduling performance reporting and communicate variances to stakeholders to aid problem solving and identification of continuous improvement opportunities.

Qualifications/Skills/Attributes

• Bachelor’s degree in Commerce, Supply Chain/Operations Management or Logistics.
• An understanding of demand planning, supply planning, inventory planning, and production scheduling. Previous experience in a manufacturing environment would be highly advantageous.
• An understanding of Enterprise Resource Planning and Material Requirements Planning principals.
• Highly competent in Microsoft Excel with an analytical / systems awareness.
• Excellent organisational, project management and time management skills; including multi-tasking, ability to prioritise and meet deadlines. Strong attention to detail.
• Data-driven with demonstrated ability to analyse and resolve problems. Strong proficiency in MS Office applications (Excel, Word, PowerPoint).
• Can build rapport with a range of people from different roles and backgrounds.

At Kiwicare, we show pride in our brands and strive to create a positive and collaborative team environment. This role is integral to the effective operations of our business and offers the opportunity to add value and help us deliver results. 

*Applications close 4 March 2022 *