Director of Planning

POSITION SUMMARY: The Planning Director leads the integrated planning function for aircraft maintenance and modification operations, ensuring programs are safely and efficiently delivered in accordance with approved work scopes, customer and regulatory requirements, resources, and schedules. The position oversees long, medium, and short-range planning, including aircraft induction, capacity and resource planning, work packages, material readiness, production scheduling, and performance monitoring. The role works cross-functionally to identify constraints, maintain achievable production plans, monitor performance, and drive corrective action to achieve aircraft turnaround, productivity, quality, cost, and delivery objectives. ESSENTIAL FUNCTIONS AND RESPONSIBILITIES: Strategic & Integrated Planning Develops and maintains long-range aircraft maintenance and modification capacity plans aligned with customer commitments, aircraft inductions, facilities, and resources. Establishes and maintains the Integrated Master Schedule (IMS) and planning standards for major programs. Converts customer, engineering, and work-scope requirements into executable production plans and establishes baselines for scope, schedule, labor, materials, and aircraft turnaround. Provides the COO and leadership team with visibility of capacity, schedule risks, resource requirements, and operational constraints. Aircraft & Production Planning Directs development and maintenance of aircraft work packages and production schedules, including inductions, sequencing, dependencies, critical-path activities, and target completion dates. Ensures work packages are sufficiently defined and resourced prior to release to Production. Establishes realistic aircraft turnaround targets and monitors progress against approved plans, escalating schedule risks and constraints. Materials & Readiness Integrates parts, materials, tooling, equipment, and technical data readiness into production planning. Works with Supply Chain, Procurement, Warehouse, and Expediting to identify and resolve material constraints affecting planned production. Ensures critical readiness requirements and constraints are visible within the production schedule. Schedule Control & Performance Establishes processes to monitor planned versus actual production performance and maintain accurate forecasts. Tracks key metrics including aircraft turnaround, task-card completion, labor hours, earned value, schedule adherence, capacity, and constraints. Leads analysis of schedule variance and coordinates recovery actions with responsible departments. Ensures planning data is accurate and maintained within approved ERP/MRO systems. Cross-Functional Coordination Provides the central planning interface between Operations, Engineering, Quality, Supply Chain, Maintenance, Modifications, Finance, and Program Management. Coordinates planning meetings, priorities, constraints, and recovery actions. Ensures changes to work scope, engineering requirements, aircraft condition, materials, or priorities are reflected in the production plan. Continuous Improvement Develops and implements improvements to planning processes, systems, methodologies, and reporting. Uses production data and lessons learned to improve labor standards, task durations, capacity models, turnaround forecasts, and schedule accuracy. Identifies opportunities to improve productivity, reduce constraints and non-productive time, and improve schedule reliability. Leadership & Governance Leads and develops the Planning team, establishing clear roles, objectives, and performance expectations. Establishes planning governance, procedures, controls, and standards and ensures consistent application across programs. Conducts performance appraisals and corrective actions in accordance with company policy. Maintains effective internal and external stakeholder relationships and performs other related duties as required. REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS: 10+ years of experience in aviation MRO, aircraft maintenance/modification, manufacturing, production planning, materials management, or related operations, including significant experience in planning and scheduling complex programs. Demonstrated experience in aircraft production planning, capacity and resource planning, work package development, schedule control, material readiness, and performance management. Strong understanding of MRO/production operations, supply chain, engineering, quality, and cross-functional dependencies and their impact on aircraft schedule and turnaround. Demonstrated ability to develop and manage integrated schedules, production plans, resource requirements, and performance metrics. Strong analytical, problem-solving, decision-making, communication, collaboration, and leadership skills, with the ability to manage competing priorities and operational constraints. Demonstrated experience leading and developing teams and influencing cross-functional stakeholders at all organizational levels. Experience with ERP/MRO systems, planning tools, and data-driven performance reporting. SUCCESS FACTORS/JOB COMPETENCIES: Strategic and analytical thinking. Strong planning, scheduling, organization, and prioritization skills. Results-oriented with strong accountability and decision-making skills. Strong problem-solving and risk management capabilities. Effective leadership and people-management skills. Strong cross-functional collaboration and stakeholder management skills. High attention to detail and data accuracy. Strong project and program management skills. Proficient in ERP/MRO, planning, scheduling, and data analysis systems. Strong written and verbal communication skills. WORK ENVIRONMENT: WORK ENVIRONMENT: This job operates in indoor settings, including office and warehouse/airplane hangar environments which require the use of standard office equipment such as computers, phones, photocopiers, filing cabinets, fax machines and safety gear. While performing the duties of this job, the employee may be occasionally exposed to fumes or airborne particles, moving mechanical parts and vibration. PHYSICAL/MENTAL DEMANDS: The physical demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions. This is a largely sedentary role; however, some movement is required. This requires the ability to frequently use the fingers to make small movements such as typing, picking up small objects, or pinching fingers together. This would also occasionally require the ability to walk; reach with hands and arms; stoop, kneel, crouch, or crawl; and talk or hear. Exerts up to 20 lbs. of force occasionally. Specific vision abilities required by this job include close vision, peripheral vision, depth perception, and the ability to adjust focus. TRAVEL: Travel may be required for this position (10% or less). WORK AUTHORIZATION/SECURITY CLEARANCE: Must be able to legally work in the US without sponsorship. EQUAL EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITY AND AFFIRMATIVE ACTION PLAN: Aspire MRO provides equal employment opportunities (EEO) to all employees and applicants for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability or genetics. Aspire will also take affirmative action as called for by applicable laws and Executive Orders to ensure that minority group individuals, females, disabled veterans, recently separated veterans, other protected veterans, Armed Forces service medal veterans, and qualified disabled persons are introduced into our workforce and considered for promotional opportunities.