Transportation Excellence Lead

Job description

**Your Job:** As the Transportation Excellence Lead at Brooks, you are responsible for designing, optimizing, and scaling Brooks’ global transportation network to support business growth, cost efficiency, and service excellence. You will serve as the subject matter expert for global transportation strategy, systems, and process design. You will be responsible for translating E2E business strategy into scalable operating models, systems, and partner strategies across ocean, rail, and trucking networks. You will interface Supply Chain Excellence, IT, Market Supply Planning, Sourcing, Customer Service, and other cross-functional teams to align Transportation processes, standards, and systems with broader Supply Chain and enterprise goals. You will drive operational, analytical, and project decisions by establishing financial and strategic guardrails, resolving issues independently, and escalating for sponsorship when required. You possess strong analytical expertise, the ability to operate in ambiguous environments, and the capability to design and implement solutions that scale with Brooks’ global growth. You will collaborate with other subject matter experts to construct business cases with clearly defined requirements and financial analyses including calculated returns on investment (ROI). For business cases that evolve into projects, you will represent Transportation in the planning and analysis, design, testing, and implementation phases. You may also assist with documenting business processes, business rules for data, and organizational roles and responsibilities. ### Your Responsibilities: Transportation Strategy & Network Optimization - Lead development and execution of key initiatives within the global end-to-end Transportation roadmap, partnering with Supply Chain leadership to ensure alignment with Brooks’ long-term supply chain strategy. - Analyze transportation network opportunities by conducting scenario modeling, reviewing carrier sourcing, and optimizing networks. Provide recommendations to support business growth and changing needs. - Monitor transportation performance metrics and recommend improvements for cost targets and service expectations across all models Carrier Sourcing - Lead carrier sourcing activities, including RFP design, rate negotiations , supplier evaluation, and selection. - Build and foster relationships with Brooks’ transportation carrier partners. - Serve as the Transportation subject matter expert (SME), providing progress analysis on carrier strategy and informing leadership on cost, capacity, and risk tradeoffs. - Negotiate periodic air and ocean freight rate agreements, balancing cost, capacity, service, and lead-time requirements. - Evaluate and select air, ocean, intermodal, and trucking carriers based on performance history, transit times, cost competitiveness, and alignment with our global transportation strategy and regional strategic initiatives. Process Design & Continuous Improvement - Own the design of global transportation processes, SOPs, and operating standards to ensure scalability, consistency, and compliance. - Lead transportation maturity frameworks, understanding current and future-state operating models and driving improvement initiatives in collaboration with Transportation team members and cross functional partners. - Lead cross-functional alignment and decision-making for process changes, ensuring solutions balance operational feasibility, system capability, and business impact. - Leverage continuous improvement/lean methodologies to problem solve and coordinate projects to measurably improve our functional and broader business KPIs. Technology Initiatives - Lead transportation technology initiatives, including requirements definition, solution design, testing, and implementation change management. - Represent Transportation in cross-functional and enterprise initiatives, ensuring alignment between business requirements and system capabilities. - Collaborate with Transportation team to establish frameworks for identifying, prioritizing, and resolving system and process issues across transportation platforms and integrations. Financial Analysis & Business Case Ownership - Develop business cases, including financial modeling, ROI analysis, and leadership recommendations to support investment decisions. - Identify cost-optimization opportunities across the transportation network to influence transportation spend through data-driven insights and recommendations. - Evaluate tradeoffs between cost, service, and risk to inform decision-making. - Manage the Freight Invoice Audit process in partnership with external auditors, Accounts Payable (AP), Network Operations, and other stakeholders. Sustainability & Performance Reporting - Contribute data, metrics, and Transportation sustainability program information to support the Brooks Annual Sustainability Report by partnering with carrier partners to gather data. - Identify opportunities for reducing carbon emissions in line with Inbound Transportation goals and the Brooks Corporate Responsibility (CR) team. Cross-Functional Partnership & Influence - Act as a thought partner to Transportation and Supply Chain leadership, providing insights and challenging assumptions to improve outcomes. - Lead cross-functional working sessions to ensure alignment and accountability across stakeholders where Transportation decisions have broader impact. - Present recommendations, risks, and performance insights to senior leadership, tailoring messaging to executive and cross-functional audiences. Team Development & Mentorship - Mentor Transportation Analysts and project contributors, providing insights on analytical frameworks, problem solving, and transportation domain expertise. - Support onboarding and enablement of new team members, contributing to the development of team capabilities and best practices. ### Qualifications: - Bachelor’s degree in Business, Supply Chain, Engineering, Information Systems, or related field; equivalent combination of education and years of experience can be considered in lieu of degree(s) - 7+ years of experience in transportation, supply chain, or related analytical roles - Lean Six Sigma certification, continuous improvement skills, or project management preferred - Demonstrated experience leading cross-functional transportation or supply chain initiatives with measurable business impact - Proven expertise in carrier strategy, sourcing, and performance management across multiple transportation modes - Advanced analytical capabilities with ability to translate data into strategic recommendations to influence decision-making - Proven ability to operate independently in ambiguous environments and develop solutions where standard processes may not exist - Demonstrated experience influencing senior leadership and cross-functional stakeholders in complex, global environments - Strong experience designing scalable processes, governance frameworks, and operating models - Advanced proficiency in transportation management systems (TMS) and analytics tools such as SQL, Power BI, or Tableau - Experience working in a fast-paced, evolving environment with competing priorities - Experience mentoring, coaching, or developing team members - Excellent verbal and written communication skills, demonstrating effective listening through concise, clear verbal and written communication - Excellent interpersonal skills that inspire and build trust resulting in effective working relationships across the company - Ability to anticipate how a decision made can affect our customers, our partners, our products, or other departments’ operations and/or morale; “connecting the dots” - Demonstration of innovation and initiative – always looking at improving our products and processes while also displaying a willingness to dive into the details and help wherever necessary - Travel 10% throughout the year - Embraces and lives the Brooks values!