Supply Operations Manager - Toronto - Forum Ventures

Description

Location: Toronto (Hybrid)
Reports to: Chief Operating Officer (Canada HQ)
Experience Level: 8–10 years

About Calico AI

Calico AI is transforming how consumer brands bring products to life — we are the agentic AI copilot for sourcing, production, and global supply-chain orchestration.

Calico serves as the intelligence layer for global manufacturing, automating design-to-delivery decisions for leading apparel and accessories brands. Our multi-agent AI system connects brands with a vetted network of factories across Vietnam, Mexico, Turkey, India, China, and beyond.

We're building a global supply engine with strong foundations: diversified capacity, rigorous compliance, and data-driven decisioning. This role sits at the center of that engine — turning factory, order, and performance data into strategy, process, and action.

About the Role

Calico AI is seeking a Supply Operations Manager to own the performance, capacity, and risk profile of our global factory network.

This role is equal parts data analysis and real-world execution. You'll synthesize complex data across suppliers, regions, and categories to identify where we should grow, optimize, or de-risk. You'll build the operating playbook for how Calico allocates volume, manages constraints, and upholds compliance standards across a diverse international network.

You'll work closely with Commercial, Customer Success, and Product/Engineering to make sure that as we onboard new brands and launch new categories, our network has the right capacity, at the right quality and risk level — all orchestrated through our AI platform.

What You'll Do

Network Strategy & Capacity Planning

• Own the health and performance view of Calico's global supplier network across regions, categories, and capabilities.

• Build and maintain capacity models that account for MOQs, lead times, seasonal peaks, and factory line availability.

• Work with Commercial and Customer teams to translate brand demand forecasts into capacity plans, allocation decisions, and sourcing strategies.

• Recommend where to scale up, rebalance, or pause suppliers based on data (OTD, quality, responsiveness, cost, risk).

Performance Analytics & Insight Generation

• Design and maintain dashboards that track key supply KPIs: on-time delivery, defect rates, quote turnaround, win/loss on RFQs, utilization, and margin contribution.

• Analyze trends across factories, countries, and product types to identify gaps, bottlenecks, and opportunities for improvement.

• Run deep dives on underperforming suppliers, categories, or lanes and recommend corrective actions.

• Partner with Product/Engineering to embed these metrics and triggers into Calico's internal tools and AI agents.

Compliance, Risk & Governance

• Maintain an up-to-date view of compliance status across the network (social, environmental, quality, security, certifications).

• Work with factories to ensure adherence to customer-specific and region-specific compliance requirements.

• Develop and refine a risk framework for country, factory, and category exposure (e.g. geopolitical, capacity, quality, logistics).

• Proactively flag and manage risk scenarios, recommending alternative capacity, dual-sourcing plans, or factory rotations when needed.

Process Design & Operational Excellence

• Define and document standard operating procedures (SOPs) for supply operations: onboarding, capacity updates, performance reviews, remediation plans.

• Create scalable, repeatable processes for collecting and validating factory data (capacity, pricing, compliance, capabilities).

• Collaborate with internal teams to streamline RFQ flows, allocation logic, and exception handling (e.g. rush orders, reallocations, escalations).

• Continuously refine how we work with factories — from communication cadences to scorecards and quarterly business reviews.

Systems, Data & Tooling

• Partner with Product and Data teams to shape how supply-side data flows into Calico's platform and AI agents.

• Help define data schemas, standards, and tags for factories, capabilities, and orders to ensure accurate matching and analytics.

• Identify and implement tools or integrations (BI, workflow, data quality) that improve visibility and reduce manual work.

Cross-Functional Collaboration & Supplier Relationships

• Serve as the internal point person for all questions related to network capacity, fit, and risk.

• Work with Commercial teams to match brands with the right factories based on capabilities, price, and risk tolerance.

• Support customer conversations with clear, data-backed perspectives on network strategy and contingency plans.

• Build strong working relationships with strategic factories, focusing on continuous improvement and long‑term growth.

What You Bring

• 8–10 years of experience in apparel or apparel‑adjacent supply chain, sourcing, production, or vendor management roles.

• Proven experience managing or optimizing a diverse, international supplier network (e.g. multiple regions, multiple factory types, multiple product categories).

• Strong analytical toolkit — comfortable working with large datasets, building dashboards, and using tools like Excel, Sheets, BI tools (e.g. Looker, Power BI, Tableau), or SQL.

• Deep understanding of apparel production fundamentals: lead times, critical paths, MOQs, capacity planning, costing, Incoterms, quality control, and compliance.

• Familiarity with social and environmental compliance standards (e.g. BSCI, WRAP, GOTS, Fair Trade) and how brands evaluate factory risk.

• Track record of designing and improving processes, not just operating within them — you can build systems that scale with growth.

• Strong communication skills, able to translate complex data and tradeoffs into clear narratives for both internal teams and external partners.

• Highly organized, detail‑oriented, and comfortable operating in a fast‑moving, high‑growth startup environment.

• Based in Canada, with flexibility to occasionally travel to visit key suppliers or attend industry events as needed.

Nice to Have

• Experience working with or alongside technology/data teams (e.g. product managers, data analysts, engineers).

• Background in working with brand‑side and factory‑side stakeholders, with empathy for both perspectives.

• Experience in nearshore and offshore manufacturing networks (e.g. Mexico, Central America, Asia, Turkey, Eastern Europe).

Application closing date: January 7