Senior Materials Buyer-Planner Location:Madison, WI
Pay:$55.00 - $59.00 per hour Job Summary The Senior Materials Buyer-Planner serves as the site subject matter expert for managing purchased materials, components, and services to ensure uninterrupted supply for production and business operations. This role oversees purchasing and material planning activities, manages supplier relationships, resolves supply disruptions, and maintains accurate procurement and planning data. The Senior Buyer-Planner also provides guidance to junior team members and leads continuous improvement initiatives to strengthen supplier performance, inventory management, and material availability. Job Responsibilities
Serve as the primary escalation point for junior Materials Buyer-Planners regarding supplier issues, material shortages, and supply continuity risks.
Mentor and support other Materials Buyer-Planners as assigned by the Materials Manager.
Lead phase-in and phase-out planning for new products and engineering changes.
Translate production requirements, forecasts, MRP signals, inventory levels, lead times, and safety stock requirements into purchase orders and material planning strategies.
Identify potential material shortages and develop recovery plans to prevent production disruptions.
Maintain SAP planning parameters, including supplier lead times, minimum order quantities, order multiples, and safety stock levels.
Partner with Materials Management, SIOP, Operations, Warehouse, Engineering, Quality, and other teams to ensure material availability.
Monitor current and projected material availability for assigned commodities and components.
Proactively identify, communicate, and escalate supply risks to support material availability at required points of use.
Create, maintain, and manage purchase orders for assigned materials and services.
Verify purchase orders accurately reflect approved pricing, quantities, delivery schedules, payment terms, and freight terms.
Communicate purchase orders, revisions, cancellations, forecasts, and delivery requirements to suppliers and obtain order acknowledgements.
Monitor open purchase orders and expedite, defer, reschedule, or cancel orders based on business requirements.
Maintain accurate purchase order dates, supplier commitments, and procurement records in SAP.
Ensure purchasing activities comply with procurement policies, controls, and approval requirements.
Maintain ownership of assigned purchase orders through delivery and successful receipt.
Serve as the primary operational contact for assigned suppliers.
Communicate forecasts, demand changes, delivery expectations, and performance requirements to suppliers.
Monitor supplier performance, lead performance reviews, communicate scorecards, and develop corrective action and recovery plans.
Identify and support the qualification and development of new suppliers and alternative material sources.
Support RFQ/RFP activities, supplier quotation analysis, and source selection.
Collaborate with Quality, Engineering, Operations, and other stakeholders on supplier qualification and onboarding.
Identify opportunities for supplier consolidation, dual sourcing, localization, lead-time reduction, and cost savings.
Maintain accurate supplier pricing in purchase orders and SAP records.
Investigate pricing discrepancies and communicate material cost impacts to Supply Chain leadership.
Ensure supplier pricing changes are reviewed and approved before implementation.
Coordinate the resolution of purchased material discrepancies with Receiving, Warehouse, Quality, Finance, and suppliers.
Lead escalations involving critical material shortages and supply disruptions.
Investigate supplier invoice discrepancies and resolve three-way match exceptions involving purchase orders, receipts, and invoices.
Maintain accurate purchasing and planning master data, including supplier lead times, minimum order quantities, order multiples, units of measure, pricing, and supplier acknowledgements.
Drive continuous improvement in supplier reliability, inventory performance, and overall materials management operations.
Job Requirements
7-10+ years of experience in materials planning, procurement, inventory management, or manufacturing operations.
Working knowledge of ERP systems, preferably SAP.
Strong understanding of purchasing, material planning, supplier management, and inventory control processes.
Strong analytical, problem-solving, and critical-thinking skills.
Ability to work independently with minimal supervision from Materials Management.
Ability to identify supply chain risks and develop effective solutions.
Strong organizational, communication, and cross-functional collaboration skills.
Ability to manage multiple priorities while maintaining accurate procurement and planning records.
Education
About Equiliem Equiliem believes in empowering success. It's our job to cultivate relationships that connect people and employers in a way that is inclusive, intelligent, and allows both to thrive. Across the U.S., leading companies in healthcare, government, engineering, manufacturing, professional services, and energy rely on us for their workforce solutions. Our recruiting and HR services include contract and direct hire staffing, Payrolling/EOR, Independent Contractor Compliance, and Managed Services. For almost 30 years, we've helped shape our industry. Today, we continue to research, ask questions, and continuously enhance the candidate journey and client experience. Benefits We offer a comprehensive benefits package to our employees, which includes:
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Equiliem
medical insurance, dental insurance, life insurance, 401(k)
Nov 09, 2026