Operations Transformation Consultant

About the role

Ffern makes natural fragrance in seasonal batches for a growing membership across the UK, Europe, the US and Canada. Every season is a new launch: a new fragrance, new packaging, and a production run that has to land in four regions on a fixed date. Our products are designed in house and produced by specialist partners, supported by a wide supplier base, so the supply chain sits at the centre of how the business grows.

We are looking for an Operations Transformation Consultant on a six-month contract. While the Operations Director is on leave, you will take responsibility for operations: supply chain, fulfilment and line management of the operations team, who run the day-to-day. Beyond that, your focus will be on making the supply chain better: moving production planning from spreadsheets onto a proper system, and finding and making the changes that will have the biggest effects on resilience, agility, quality and cost.

About you

You have led production or supply chain functions before, have experience driving improvement, and are comfortable being the person who makes the call when a season is on the line. You think clearly about systems and processes, learn a new business quickly, and can hold your own with suppliers.

You'll have:
• Experience across a number of agile and fast growing businesses with a proven track record of transformation and improvements.
• Fast learner who can take on an unfamiliar supply chain, business and set of tools quickly.
• Able to analyse a supply chain, find the constraints and risks, rank what to do about them, and implement changes sustainably.
• A sound understanding of planning: bills of materials, lead times, bottlenecks and the logic behind MRP.
• Confident managing suppliers and negotiating day-to-day terms, timings and issues.
• Manages and develops people well: sets clear priorities, supports without taking over, and knows when to step in.
• Works well with Finance, Growth and Design.

And we'd love it if you also have these, but it's not essential:
• Interim, contract or consulting experience in an operational setting.
• Fragrance, cosmetics or other regulated consumer goods (IFRA, cosmetics regulation, hazardous goods shipping).
• Seasonal or launch-driven products.
• Specifying or implementing an MRP or ERP system.
• Building automations with no-code tools.

What you'll do

Lead operations while the Operations Director is on leave:
• Be accountable for each season landing at our fulfilment partners on time and in full, and for orders reaching customers, delivered through your team.
• Line-manage the Production Manager, Supply Chain Planner and Operations Executive: set priorities, review the plan and its risks, remove blockers, and step in yourself where a major risk calls for it.
• Run the production decision points with the wider business, bringing the plan, its options and its risks.
• Handle escalations across suppliers, production, freight and fulfilment partners, and keep the wider business informed.

Improve how we plan:
• Lead the move from spreadsheet planning to a planning system, from completing the evaluation to going live on at least one product line.
• Put the data behind it in order: bills of materials, lead times, order quantities and costs.
• Shape our supply chain operating model so that volume decisions can be made as late as possible without adding risk.

Find what matters most:
• Map the supply chain for constraints, risks and waste: lead times that could be shorter, single points of failure, contracts and supplier positions that need attention.
• Rank the opportunities, act on the ones that fit within six months, and hand over the rest with clear recommendations.