Senior Solutions Design & Costing Manager The Senior Solutions Design & Costing Manager owns Knight-Swift Supply Chain's (KSSC) solution design and costing capability end to end — leading the design of scalable warehousing and fulfillment solutions, the development of accurate and auditable cost models, and the translation of the sales pipeline into a forward-looking growth and capacity plan. This role is the single accountable owner for answering three questions on every opportunity: whether KSSC can operationally support the work, what facilities, labor, technology, and capital are required to do so, and what KSSC must charge to achieve the targeted return while managing risk. Beyond individual pursuits, this role sustains solution design as a living business capability — standardizing the methodology and models the organization designs from, maintaining the rolling capacity plan that tells leadership when new buildings, automation, and labor markets will be needed, and validating sold assumptions against actual performance after go-live. Positioned within Business Excellence so that operational and pricing assumptions are independently validated, and partnering closely with Business Development, Operations, Finance, Information Technology, and Corporate Projects, the Senior Manager leads a Pricing Analyst and protects the margin, credibility, and executability of every commitment KSSC makes to a customer — bringing Ownership and Quality to life in the way we grow.
Essential Duties and Responsibilities
Solutions Design:
Analyzes customer RFPs, operational data, volume forecasts, SKU and order profiles, and service level requirements to define operational requirements.
Designs receiving, storage, replenishment, picking, packing, value-added service, and shipping processes.
Determines facility space, pallet positions, storage media, dock doors, staging areas, labor, material handling equipment (MHE), automation, and technology requirements.
Develops base, expected, peak, and growth scenarios for each solution.
Evaluates manual, mechanized, and automated alternatives, including goods-to-person (GTP) systems, and recommends the option that best balances cost, throughput, scalability, and risk.
Partners with Information Technology to define integration, reporting, infrastructure, and support requirements across Warehouse Management Systems (WMS), Yard Management Systems (YMS), Labor Management Systems (LMS), Order Management Systems (OMS), and Logistics Execution Systems (LES).Validates that every proposed solution can be implemented, staffed, and operated successfully before it is committed to a customer.
Costing and Pricing Support:
Builds and maintains standardized, auditable cost models covering direct and indirect labor; management and support staffing; facility and occupancy expense; MHE, racking, and automation; IT systems and integrations; packaging and operating supplies; transportation and subcontracted services; start-up and transition costs; capital requirements; and contingency and risk. Develops transaction-based, fixed-fee, cost-plus, and hybrid pricing structures appropriate to the opportunity. Performs sensitivity, break-even, and margin analysis on all pricing scenarios. Identifies the customer assumptions, volume commitments, and contractual protections required to preserve profitability. Supports Finance and Business Development during pricing reviews, customer presentations, and contract negotiations. Provides independent validation of operational and pricing assumptions, maintaining analytical objectivity separate from the sales process.
Growth and Capacity Planning:
Converts the qualified sales pipeline into projected space, labor, capital, and technology requirements.
Builds and maintains a rolling 12-, 24-, and 36-month network capacity plan.
Identifies when new buildings, expansions, automation investment, or entry into new labor markets will be required.
Models the effects of customer growth, seasonality, renewals, contractions, and facility exits on network capacity.
Identifies opportunities to consolidate operations or absorb volume into available capacity across the network.
Supports proactive real estate searches in advance of capacity becoming a constraint.
Produces capital forecasts covering racking, MHE, automation, and IT investment.
Conducts labor-market assessments evaluating wage levels, workforce availability, turnover, and staffing risk by market.
Provides leadership with visibility into the investment required to support expected growth.
Implementation Handoff and Post-Go-Live Validation:
Produces a formal solution-design package for Operations, Information Technology, Operations and Analytics Excellence (OAX), Finance, and Corporate Projects.
Documents productivity standards, staffing models, equipment requirements, assumptions, risks, and customer commitments in every handoff package.
Participates in implementation planning and operational readiness reviews.
Compares actual post-go-live results against the original solution design and cost model and leads the review of variances.
Incorporates lessons learned into solution standards and maintains a solution library of reusable models, layouts, and benchmarks.
Team Leadership and Function Ownership:
Supervises, coaches, and develops the Pricing Analyst; sets priorities, balances workload across concurrent opportunities, and builds technical, financial, and presentation capability. Owns the standard solution-design methodology, the standard costing model, and the assumption and risk register, and enforces documentation, version control, and peer review across all deliverables. Builds and maintains the sales pipeline capacity model and network capacity dashboard in Tableau or Power BI, giving leadership visibility into available, committed, and projected capacity. Operates to defined response-time expectations for opportunity support and reports on function performance measures, including RFP response time and on-time proposal completion; cost-model accuracy measured as modeled versus actual labor productivity, operating cost, and space utilization; start-up budget variance; gross-margin accuracy; opportunities supported and win rate on qualified opportunities; post-go-live validation completion; and accuracy of the 12-, 24-, and 36-month capacity forecasts. Performs other duties as assigned.
Required Qualifications:
Bachelor's degree in Industrial Engineering, Supply Chain, Logistics, Business, or a related field required; Industrial Engineering preferred.
Ten (10) or more years of progressive experience in solutions design, industrial engineering, supply chain analytics, or pricing.
Minimum of five (5) years in a third-party logistics (3PL) environment designing solutions and building RFP costing models.
Demonstrated experience leading, supervising, or mentoring analysts.
Advanced financial and operational modeling skills, including engineered labor standards, activity-based costing, capital modeling, and pro forma profit and loss development.
Experience developing transaction-based, fixed-fee, cost-plus, and hybrid pricing structures, including sensitivity, break-even, and margin analysis.
Experience translating a sales pipeline or demand forecast into projected space, labor, capital, and technology requirements.
Experience designing facility layouts, slotting strategies, storage media selection, and material flow concepts.
Experience supporting new account start-ups, implementation planning, and operational readiness reviews.
Working knowledge of Tier 1 and Tier 2 Warehouse Management Systems (WMS).Working knowledge of goods-to-person (GTP) and other warehouse automation technologies, including hands-on deployment experience.
Proficiency with Tableau or Power BI.Proficiency with AutoCAD or Visio for facility layout and process mapping.
Experience with ERP platforms, including NetSuite, and with CRM systems.
Ability to present complex technical and financial information clearly to executive leadership and customer audiences, and to defend assumptions to Sales, Operations, and Finance stakeholders.
Demonstrated ability to manage multiple concurrent opportunities and competing deadlines with a high degree of accuracy.
Lean Six Sigma Green Belt preferred.
SQL or comparable data query tools preferred.
Experience with LMS, OMS, LES, and YMS preferred.
Experience with labor-market analysis, including wage benchmarking, workforce availability, and turnover risk, preferred.
Experience applying AI tools to analysis, modeling, or documentation workflows preferred.
Ability to work onsite at the corporate headquarters full time.
Ability to travel up to 20 percent.
Physical Demands:
Primarily sedentary work with extended periods of computer use. Occasionally required to lift and transport equipment or training materials (up to 2
