Senior Manager, Tooling FTW

Purpose 

• Key player in Sourcing in driving Sourcing’s vision to be the Most Agile, Most Competitive, Most Digitalized & Cleanest Supply Base in the industry.  

• Drive and manage tooling team members to drive tooling efficiency and quality in T1 factories, mold shops, and/or component suppliers, and support PCT in future technology, policy development and update. 

• Manage the tooling creation & tooling manufacturing process within the assigned factory / factory groups with focus on lead time and quality. Ensure adidas innovation technologies and processes are implemented in all factory / factory groups that he / she is responsible for. 

Key Responsibilities  

Tooling Management 

• Lead one or more tooling team in the assigned factory / factory groups for tooling related processes in tooling development, commercialization and production and ensure quality, lead times, rejection rate, productivity and price conformity. 

• Consult and participate in LO Costing team in tooling costing process. Liable for submitting theoretical weight and verifying cycle time for outsole.  

• Contribute to the adidas lean manufacturing program for mold suppliers from tooling side and implement forecasting & planning tools within local mold suppliers to cut tooling creation & manufacturing lead times. 

• Ensure T1 tooling data is available and up-to-date in the regional tooling data management system and aiding the further development of the system. 

• Manage issues related to cross-country mold transfers in terms of transfer times, quality, taxation and further concerns, and support LO, T1 and T2 teams on technical and tooling related issues. 

Product Creation Technologies 

• Assist manufacturing excellence initiatives from a country level. 

• Lead factories and mold shops to build strong capabilities in the area of CAD creation, rapid prototyping, and mold creation. 

• In collaboration with PCT team to lead assigned Tier1 factory / factory groups to publish, establish and evaluate PCT policies, best practices and procedures and identifying improvement opportunities. 

• Manage biyearly production mold audit, product security, mold shop performance tracking (RFT, OTD) to maintain and enhance tooling data security and mold quality. 

• Support Regional PCT & Tooling, Asia on creation of PCT documentations, implement and provide operations feedback to enhance existing best practices, policies, guidelines and other process standards. 

• Provide input and update needed to support tooling allocation among adidas released mold shops. 

Training and Administration 

• Participate in the PCT Technical Training throughout the LO organization to ensure Brand, Tier1 & Tier2 staff meet adidas group technical competencies. 

• Establish well-structured tooling trainings for development/commercialization staffs for technical skills enhancement and for other functional staffs within LO to get a general understanding of technical points.  

• Creation, administration and facilitation of visitor schedules, managing the timelines and relationships with both visitors and T1s / component suppliers. 

Management and General Responsibilities 

• DPC / DSO during the management of the seasonal tooling allocation to ensure consistent workload and project complexity for adidas released mold suppliers. 

• Act as an intermediary for escalation of mold cost template complexity issues, tooling transfer issues. 

• Ensure all sourcing operations and practices fully comply with adidas’ Responsible Sourcing & Purchasing Policy, adidas standards and legal requirements, while managing the relevant processes internally and externally. 

• Role model leadership to foster a culture of Diversity Equity & Inclusion that strives for an inclusive workplace. 

Key Relationships:  

• Global Sourcing: PCT, E&MI 

• Headquarter Technical Teams (Tooling), HQ PJMs 

• Product Operations  

• Sourcing suppliers   

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities:  

• Strong technical knowledge of tooling design, engineering, mold making and manufacturing, CAD, CAM and RP 

• Excellent technical footwear knowledge of product construction and manufacturing methods 

• Good knowledge in Lean manufacturing and process automation 

• Strong presentation, negotiation, influencing, interpersonal and communication skills. 

• Fluent in English (written and spoken) 

• Strong MS Office Skills, CAD software (eg Rhino or similar CAD software) 

• Strong leadership skills and ability to work with multidimensional teams. 

Requisite Education and Experience / Minimum Qualifications:   

• University degree in engineering/ materials or related areas