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Key Responsibilities and Required Skills for Work Planner

💰 $ - $

OperationsMaintenancePlanningSupply Chain

🎯 Role Definition

The Work Planner is responsible for translating maintenance and production needs into executable, safe, and cost-effective work plans. This role coordinates scheduling, materials, labor, permits, and contractors to ensure on-time completion of preventive, corrective, and project-based work while maximizing equipment availability and minimizing downtime. The Work Planner leverages CMMS/EAM systems (e.g., Maximo, SAP PM), inventory data, and cross-functional stakeholder input to prioritize work, control costs, and drive continuous improvement in maintenance and operations planning.

📈 Career Progression

Typical Career Path

Entry Point From:

  • Maintenance Technician or Mechanical/Electrical Technician transitioning to planning
  • Production Scheduler or Production Planner seeking a maintenance planning focus
  • Junior Planner / Administrative Coordinator in maintenance or operations

Advancement To:

  • Senior Work Planner / Senior Maintenance Planner
  • Planning Supervisor / Planning Team Lead
  • Maintenance Manager / Operations Manager

Lateral Moves:

  • Materials / Inventory Planner
  • Supply Chain Analyst (focused on MRO and spares)
  • Reliability Engineer (with emphasis on RCM and PM optimization)

Core Responsibilities

Primary Functions

  • Create, review, and prioritize detailed work orders and maintenance plans in the CMMS/EAM (e.g., IBM Maximo, SAP PM, Oracle eAM), ensuring accurate scope, labor hours, required skills, tools, and consumables are defined for safe and efficient execution.
  • Schedule preventive maintenance (PM) and corrective maintenance tasks to optimize asset availability while minimizing production disruption; balance short-term reactive work with long-term reliability strategies.
  • Coordinate cross-functional stakeholders (production supervision, maintenance crews, safety, quality, and procurement) to secure approvals, confirm resource availability, and align work windows with operational constraints.
  • Perform materials planning and parts reservation for scheduled work; generate purchase requisitions, expedite critical parts, and manage MRO inventory allocations to avoid work stoppages.
  • Estimate labor requirements and skillsets needed for each job, align craft labor schedules and subcontractor availability, and assign qualified personnel to tasks to ensure compliance with trade certifications and company standards.
  • Develop detailed job plans for major outages, turnarounds, and shutdowns including sequencing, critical path scheduling, resource leveling, and contingency planning to meet scope, budget, and timeline targets.
  • Validate and update BOMs, spare parts lists, and equipment history in the CMMS to improve first-time-fix rates and reduce unnecessary site visits by technicians.
  • Perform risk assessments and permit-to-work coordination (confined space, lockout-tagout, hot work) to ensure compliance with EHS policies and local regulations prior to work release.
  • Analyze historical maintenance data, failure modes, and work order trends to recommend PM optimization, spares reduction, and reliability improvements using root cause analysis and RCM principles.
  • Track and report key performance indicators (KPIs) such as work backlog, schedule compliance, mean time to repair (MTTR), mean time between failures (MTBF), and preventive maintenance completion rate to inform continuous improvement initiatives.
  • Coordinate contractor procurement and management for specialized scopes of work, including contractor pre-qualification, scope definition, work pack development, scheduling, and performance monitoring.
  • Generate and maintain work packs and job hazard analyses (JHAs) with step-by-step instructions, required tools, safety checklists, and quality acceptance criteria to ensure consistent work execution.
  • Lead weekly planning meetings and sprint planning sessions for maintenance teams, communicating priorities, constraints, and resource assignments to frontline supervisors and technicians.
  • Ensure data integrity and standardization of work order coding, task categorization, and downtime reasons in the CMMS to enable accurate reporting and trend analysis.
  • Prepare detailed cost estimates for maintenance projects and routine work, track actual costs vs. budget, and identify opportunities for cost reduction through materials consolidation and vendor negotiation.
  • Support continuous improvement projects by applying Lean Maintenance, Kaizen, or Six Sigma tools to reduce waste, shorten repair cycles, and improve planning efficiency.
  • Maintain master maintenance schedules and short-term (daily/weekly) shop schedules; coordinate shift handovers and planning buffers to handle emergent work while protecting scheduled activities.
  • Facilitate materials kitting and staging for complex jobs to reduce execution time, ensure accuracy of parts issued, and eliminate rework due to missing components.
  • Collaborate with engineering and reliability teams to convert failure investigations into sustainable design or PM changes, ensuring updates are reflected in the work planning system and training materials.
  • Manage work order close-out quality: verify completed tasks, capture actual labor and materials usage, update equipment history, and follow up on any deferred actions to keep asset records current.
  • Coordinate multi-discipline teams (mechanical, electrical, instrumentation, controls) for integrated tasks and ensure sequencing and prerequisites are clearly defined to avoid conflicts in shared workspaces.
  • Develop and maintain standardized planning templates, checklists, and SOPs to improve planner productivity and ensure consistent quality of work packs.
  • Provide escalation management for overdue or high-priority work, facilitating decisions with operations leadership and recommending re-prioritization as required.
  • Support outage readiness reviews and pre-shutdown inspections, verifying that all required permits, parts, and resources are available and that contingency plans are in place.
  • Deliver training and mentorship to junior planners and technicians on CMMS best practices, job planning techniques, and safety/permitting requirements to build planning capability across the organization.

Secondary Functions

  • Support ad-hoc data requests and exploratory data analysis.
  • Contribute to the organization's data strategy and roadmap.
  • Collaborate with business units to translate data needs into engineering requirements.
  • Participate in sprint planning and agile ceremonies within the data engineering team.

Required Skills & Competencies

Hard Skills (Technical)

  • Proficiency with CMMS/EAM systems (IBM Maximo, SAP PM, Oracle eAM or equivalent) for work order creation, scheduling, and asset history management.
  • Strong scheduling and resource allocation skills using tools like MS Project, Primavera, or production scheduling software.
  • Materials planning and inventory control experience, including MRO spares management, demand forecasting, and parts reservation workflows.
  • Ability to create detailed job plans, step-by-step procedures, and safety-critical work packs with accurate labor and parts estimates.
  • Familiarity with maintenance methodologies: preventive maintenance (PM), predictive maintenance (PdM), reliability-centered maintenance (RCM), and root cause analysis (RCA).
  • Competence in Microsoft Excel (advanced formulas, pivot tables), Power BI or Tableau for KPI reporting and data analysis.
  • Knowledge of permit-to-work systems, lockout-tagout (LOTO), confined space, and other EHS requirements.
  • Experience coordinating contractors, scopes of work, and contractor safety pre-qualifications.
  • Ability to read and interpret engineering drawings, P&IDs, electrical schematics, and equipment datasheets.
  • Budgeting and cost control experience for maintenance projects, including tracking actuals vs. estimates.
  • Experience with continuous improvement frameworks (Lean, Kaizen, Six Sigma) applied to maintenance planning processes.
  • Basic familiarity with condition monitoring tools and techniques (vibration, ultrasound, thermography) to incorporate PdM inputs into planning.

Soft Skills

  • Excellent stakeholder management and communication skills to align operations, maintenance crews, procurement, and contractors.
  • Strong analytical and problem-solving skills with the ability to transform data into actionable scheduling decisions.
  • High attention to detail and organizational skills for managing multiple work streams, backlogs, and deadlines.
  • Ability to prioritize under pressure and make pragmatic trade-offs between production and maintenance needs.
  • Collaborative mindset and ability to lead planning meetings and coordinate cross-functional teams.
  • Adaptability to work in dynamic manufacturing or industrial environments with changing priorities.
  • Coaching and mentoring capabilities to develop junior planners and technicians.
  • Proactive mindset with a focus on continuous improvement and results-driven planning.

Education & Experience

Educational Background

Minimum Education:

  • High school diploma or GED plus technical diploma / trade certification (mechanical, electrical, instrumentation) OR
  • Associate degree in Industrial Maintenance, Mechanical Technology, or a related technical field.

Preferred Education:

  • Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering, Industrial Engineering, Supply Chain, Operations Management, or closely related field.

Relevant Fields of Study:

  • Mechanical, Electrical, or Industrial Engineering
  • Maintenance Technology / Industrial Maintenance
  • Supply Chain Management / Logistics
  • Operations Management
  • Reliability Engineering

Experience Requirements

Typical Experience Range: 2–7 years of progressively responsible experience in maintenance planning, production scheduling, or a related operations role.

Preferred:

  • 5+ years of hands-on planning experience in manufacturing, petrochemical, utilities, or heavy industrial environments.
  • Demonstrated experience using CMMS/EAM systems (Maximo, SAP PM) and executing outage/turnaround planning.
  • Proven track record of improving schedule compliance, reducing backlog, and optimizing spare parts inventory through data-driven planning.
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