Leader, Material Manager

As the global leader in high-speed connectivity, Ciena is committed to a people-first approach. Our teams enjoy a culture focused on prioritizing a flexible work environment that empowers individual growth, well-being, and belonging. We’re a technology company that leads with our humanity—driving our business priorities alongside meaningful social, community, and societal impact. At Ciena, the Leader, Material Management enables successful new product introductions by ensuring material readiness from prototype builds through early production ramp. This role drives alignment across engineering, planning, procurement, manufacturing, and external partners to support launch readiness, supply continuity, and lifecycle execution. The position contributes to scalable and repeatable processes that support predictable product launches and operational performance.     How you will make an impact:   • Lead material management execution for NPI programs, ensuring material availability, supplier readiness, build schedule alignment, and escalation planning before major program milestones.   • Own clear-to-build readiness for prototype, pilot, qualification, and early ramp builds, including shortage reviews, long-lead component visibility, supplier commitments, allocation decisions, and recovery actions.   • Partner with EMS manufacturing partners to establish executable build plans, confirm material commitments, identify production risks, and manage prototype-to-ramp transitions.   • Collaborate with Engineering and Product Line Management to evaluate BOM maturity, engineering change impact, revision control, lifecycle status, and material disposition requirements.   • Utilize Kinaxis, Agile, and supporting analytics tools to align demand, supply, component availability, and supplier execution.   • Lead cross-functional material readiness reviews across NPI, Engineering, Procurement, Global Commodity Management, Quality, Manufacturing Operations, Fulfillment, and Demand Planning.   • Develop operating cadences, dashboards, and metrics that provide visibility into clear-to-build status, shortage aging, supplier commitment quality, engineering change impact, inventory exposure, and ramp readiness.     The must haves:   • Experience: 8+ years of experience in material management, supply planning, procurement, manufacturing operations, product operations, or a related supply chain function, including direct exposure to new product introduction and outsourced manufacturing execution.   • Application of NPI program support from prototype through early ramp, including material readiness, BOM maturity, clear-to-build management, supplier commitments, shortage recovery, and transition to sustaining operations.   • Application of MRP/ERP logic, material planning processes, inventory controls, supplier commitments, procurement standards, and JIT principles including Kanban, pull systems, VMI, or SMI.   • Experience working with EMS or contract manufacturing partners in electronics, telecom, networking, optical systems, or high-reliability manufacturing environments.   • Ability to interpret complex datasets, identify supply risk, summarize exposure, and convert analysis into decisions and actions.   • Ability to influence and drive closure across Engineering, PLM, Procurement, Commodity Management, Manufacturing Operations, Quality, Fulfillment, and Demand Planning.   • Fluency in English.     Nice to haves:   • Certifications: APICS/ASCM certification such as CPIM or CSCP.   • Experience: Application of Kinaxis for supply planning, scenario analysis, shortage management, clear-to-build visibility, or ramp readiness.   • Experience: Application of Agile/PLM for BOM readiness, lifecycle status, engineering change review, and NPI governance.   • Experience: Utilization of Power BI, Excel-based analytics, or other tools used to create material readiness dashboards and executive-level