Maintenance Planner

Role overview

This position is responsible for coordinating planned and corrective maintenance across a raisin manufacturing facility in Upington. The focus is on keeping operations running smoothly by organizing maintenance work in a way that limits downtime, protects asset reliability, and supports plant availability.

The role covers maintenance planning across processing, drying, packing, and utility areas. It also requires close attention to food safety, engineering standards, cost discipline, and the effective use of the SAP CMMS environment.

What you will do

• Organize, sequence, and monitor preventive, predictive, statutory, planned, and breakdown maintenance activities.
• Make sure maintenance work is properly prepared by checking work orders, labour, tools, materials, and other resource needs in advance.
• Work closely with Production, Engineering, Stores, and contractors so maintenance plans match operational priorities.
• Maintain SAP CMMS data quality by creating, tracking, validating, and closing work orders accurately.
• Collect maintenance information, study trends, and use findings to support root cause analysis, reporting, and continuous improvement.
• Prepare practical reports that help improve equipment performance and guide maintenance decisions.
• Develop, update, and improve maintenance plans and schedules for production, packing, and utility equipment.
• Lead weekly, monthly, and annual planning cycles, including shutdowns, maintenance day plans, and seasonal maintenance work.
• Estimate the full scope of maintenance jobs, including duration, priority, labour, spares, tools, specialist services, and materials.
• Coordinate spares, outside service providers, statutory inspections, and contract labour where needed.
• Manage maintenance backlogs and ensure work is completed and closed out in a timely manner.
• Support reliability improvement efforts by contributing to failure analysis and turning findings into action plans.
• Track KPIs, backlog levels, schedule adherence, asset care indicators, and engineering scorecard results.
• Help with budgeting and cost control using historical analysis and zero-based budgeting principles.
• Maintain technical records such as drawings, P&IDs, OEM manuals, SOPs, and equipment history files.
• Keep maintenance teams and production teams trained on procedures and proper SAP CMMS use.
• Drive compliance with safety, food safety, permit, lockout/tagout, and statutory requirements.

Planning and execution focus

This job places strong emphasis on making sure maintenance is ready to go before execution begins. That includes defining the scope clearly, confirming access and safety requirements, and aligning the timing of work with production and cleaning windows. The role also involves reviewing completed work, identifying gaps, and ensuring deferred tasks are tracked properly.

Qualifications and experience

• A Certificate or Diploma in Engineering such as Mechanical, Electrical, Industrial, or an equivalent field is required.
• A Trade Test qualification is an advantage.
• Formal SAP PM or CMMS training or certification is an advantage.
• Applicants should have 3 to 5 years of experience in maintenance planning, maintenance coordination, or engineering maintenance in a manufacturing or FMCG setting.
• Experience should include preventive, predictive, and corrective maintenance planning, as well as shutdown coordination and backlog control.
• Exposure to food safety, EHS standards, statutory compliance, and automated production systems is expected.

Technical knowledge and capability

• Strong understanding of maintenance planning and scheduling methods.
• Working knowledge of root cause analysis techniques.
• Familiarity with reliability metrics such as MTBF and MTTR, plus asset care practices.
• Knowledge of preventive and predictive maintenance methods.
• Understanding of lifecycle asset management.
• Ability to manage spares and assess equipment criticality.
• Awareness of condition monitoring methods such as vibration analysis and thermography.
• Comfort with engineering documents including P&IDs, OEM manuals, and SOPs.

Behavioural strengths

• Strong planning and organization skills with the ability to handle several priorities at once.
• Analytical thinking and a data-led approach to problem solving.
• Excellent attention to detail, especially when handling SAP CMMS records and reports.
• Clear communication and strong stakeholder coordination skills.
• Ability to work under pressure and adjust to changing operational needs.
• Leadership and influencing ability to encourage maintenance discipline and compliance.
• A proactive, accountable, and improvement-focused mindset.
• Strong commitment to safety, food safety, and operational excellence.

Additional information

This is a full-time, onsite role based in Upington, Northern Cape, South Africa. The position is part of a manufacturing environment where maintenance planning must support production continuity, cost control, and plant reliability. No salary, vacancy count, or start date was provided.