Inventory Planning Assistant / Specialist

We're Hiring: Inventory Planning Assistant / Specialist

Location: United Arab Emirates (Remote)

Employment Type: Full-Time

Experience Level: Mid-Level to Senior

Work Arrangement: Fully Remote

About Us

We are a globally focused organization committed to improving inventory availability, supply chain efficiency, and operational performance across diverse markets.

Our teams collaborate across Inventory, Demand Planning, Supply Planning, Procurement, Warehousing, Logistics, Distribution, Sales, Finance, Operations, and Technology to maintain the right inventory at the right location and time while balancing service levels, working capital, and operating costs.

The Role

We are seeking an analytical and organized Inventory Planning Assistant / Specialist to support inventory planning, replenishment, stock-level optimization, demand analysis, supply coordination, inventory allocation, and performance monitoring.

The ideal candidate will analyze demand and inventory data, maintain planning parameters, identify potential shortages and excess stock, coordinate replenishment activities, and work with cross-functional teams to improve inventory availability while controlling inventory investment and operational risk.

Key Responsibilities

• Support daily, weekly, and monthly inventory planning activities.
• Monitor inventory levels across warehouses, distribution centers, stores, branches, and other locations.
• Analyze current stock, demand, supply, open orders, lead times, and inventory commitments.
• Support replenishment planning based on forecasts, historical demand, inventory policies, and operational requirements.
• Monitor stock availability and identify potential shortages before they affect customer service or operations.
• Identify excess, slow-moving, obsolete, and aging inventory and recommend appropriate actions.
• Maintain inventory targets, minimum and maximum stock levels, reorder points, safety-stock parameters, and other planning settings.
• Review and update inventory planning parameters based on demand patterns, lead-time changes, service requirements, and business priorities.
• Monitor inventory coverage, days of supply, and projected stock positions.
• Analyze demand trends, seasonality, promotions, product launches, and other factors affecting inventory requirements.
• Coordinate with Demand Planning teams to understand forecast changes and potential inventory impacts.
• Coordinate with Procurement teams regarding purchase requirements, supplier lead times, order quantities, and expected deliveries.
• Coordinate with suppliers to monitor purchase-order commitments and expected arrival dates where applicable.
• Support Supply Planning teams by identifying inventory constraints, supply gaps, and replenishment requirements.
• Coordinate with Warehouse and Distribution teams regarding stock availability, transfers, receiving capacity, and inventory movements.
• Support inventory allocation across locations based on demand, stock availability, service requirements, and business priorities.
• Recommend stock transfers between locations to balance inventory and reduce shortages or excess stock.
• Monitor inventory in transit and incorporate expected receipts into projected stock positions.
• Track open purchase orders, transfer orders, inbound shipments, and other supply commitments.
• Identify delayed or at-risk inbound inventory and assess potential service impacts.
• Escalate supply or inventory risks to relevant stakeholders.
• Support contingency planning for supplier delays, demand spikes, supply shortages, and other inventory disruptions.
• Analyze historical inventory performance to identify recurring shortages, excess stock, and planning issues.
• Support inventory forecasting and replenishment calculations using approved planning methodologies.
• Review forecast accuracy and identify significant deviations between planned and actual demand.
• Analyze inventory consumption, order patterns, customer demand, and product lifecycle trends.
• Support new-product introductions, product launches, promotions, seasonal events, and product discontinuations from an inventory-planning perspective.
• Develop inventory plans for new products based on expected demand, lead times, launch schedules, and supply constraints.
• Support end-of-life and phase-out planning to minimize obsolete inventory.
• Coordinate inventory transition plans when products are replaced, reformulated, redesigned, or discontinued.
• Monitor inventory availability for critical, high-value, strategic, or customer-sensitive products.
• Establish appropriate escalation processes for critical stock risks.
• Support inventory segmentation using ABC, XYZ, value, demand variability, criticality, or other approved methodologies.
• Analyze safety-stock requirements and recommend adjustments based on demand variability and service-level objectives.
• Review supplier lead-time performance and incorporate changes into inventory planning parameters.
• Monitor minimum order quantities, order multiples, case quantities, pallet quantities, and other procurement constraints.
• Evaluate replenishment quantities against storage capacity, supplier constraints, demand, and inventory targets.
• Support economic order quantity and order-frequency analysis where applicable.
• Monitor inventory turnover, working capital, and days of inventory on hand.
• Identify opportunities to reduce excess working capital while maintaining required service levels.
• Coordinate with Finance on inventory value, working-capital targets, provisions, write-offs, and inventory reporting where applicable.
• Support inventory budgeting and planning activities.
• Maintain accurate inventory master data and planning parameters in ERP, planning, WMS, or supply-chain systems.
• Review item master data, lead times, planning methods, reorder points, safety stock, supplier information, and other relevant parameters.
• Identify inaccurate, outdated, or inconsistent planning data and coordinate corrections.
• Use ERP, inventory-planning, demand-planning, WMS, TMS, BI, and analytics systems effectively.
• Develop and maintain inventory-planning reports, dashboards, trackers, and analytical models.
• Prepare daily, weekly, and monthly inventory performance reports.
• Track inventory KPIs and provide analysis of significant changes and trends.
• Support scenario analysis for changes in demand, supply, lead times, service levels, or inventory policies.
• Evaluate the potential inventory impact of promotions, major orders, market changes, and operational disruptions.
• Participate in cross-functional inventory and supply-chain planning meetings.
• Communicate inventory risks, opportunities, and recommended actions clearly to stakeholders.
• Support root-cause analysis for recurring stockouts, excess inventory, forecast deviations, and replenishment failures.
• Develop and track corrective and preventive actions.

Key Performance Indicators

• Inventory availability
• Stockout rate
• Service level
• Fill rate
• Inventory forecast accuracy
• Replenishment accuracy
• Inventory plan adherence
• Safety-stock accuracy
• Reorder-point accuracy
• Inventory coverage
• Days of inventory on hand
• Inventory turnover
• Excess inventory value
• Slow-moving inventory value
• Obsolete inventory value
• Inventory aging
• Working capital tied up in inventory
• Inventory value versus budget
• Purchase-order coverage
• Inbound supply reliability
• Supplier lead-time adherence
• Replenishment cycle time
• Purchase-order fulfillment rate
• Inventory transfer effectiveness
• Stock transfer cycle time
• Critical-stock availability
• Demand-supply gap resolution
• Forecast bias
• Demand variance
• Planning parameter accuracy
• Inventory master-data accuracy
• System planning-data accuracy
• Safety-stock exception rate
• Reorder exception rate
• Expedite frequency
• Emergency replenishment rate
• Inventory write-off value
• Inventory provision value
• New-product inventory readiness
• Product phase-out inventory performance
• Promotion inventory readiness
• Inventory risk identification lead time
• Inventory issue resolution time
• Inventory planning report accuracy
• Planning process compliance
• Corrective-action closure rate
• Inventory cost savings
• Working-capital improvement
• Process improvement completion

Ideal Candidate

The successful candidate should have strong experience in inventory planning, supply planning, demand planning, replenishment, stock control, supply chain, procurement, or distribution planning, preferably within retail, e-commerce, manufacturing, wholesale, 3PL, or other inventory-intensive environments.

The candidate should demonstrate:

• Strong understanding of inventory planning and replenishment principles.
• Experience analyzing inventory levels, demand, supply, lead times, and stock requirements.
• Strong knowledge of safety stock, reorder points, inventory coverage, and replenishment parameters.
• Experience identifying and managing stockouts, excess inventory, slow-moving stock, and obsolete inventory.
• Strong analytical, numerical, and problem-solving capabilities.
• Excellent attention to detail and data accuracy.
• Experience using ERP, inventory-planning, demand-planning, WMS, or supply-chain systems.
• Strong proficiency in Microsoft Excel and inventory-analysis tools.
• Ability to work with large datasets and translate analysis into practical recommendations.
• Understanding of demand forecasting, supply planning, procurement, and logistics processes.
• Experience coordinating with Procurement, Warehousing, Logistics, Sales, Finance, and Operations teams.
• Strong understanding of inventory costs, working capital, and service-level trade-offs.