Maintenance Planner / Scheduler – Onsite for ( Cell Therapy )

Location: Tarzana

Duration: 3 months - but could be convert

Working Hours: 7:00-3:30 5X weekly onsite

Interview Process: Interview Process: 2 rounds

1st: 30 minute screening call

2nd: 2 or 2.5 hr onsite interview with the team

Title: Maintenance Planner/Scheduler – Onsite for (Cell Therapy)

Job Description

At Client, Maintenance Planner & Scheduler is responsible for planning, coordinating, and scheduling preventive, predictive, corrective, and shutdown maintenance and calibration activities for manufacturing, laboratory, utility, and facility systems that support cell therapy operations. This role requires strong technical understanding of GMP-regulated environments, critical utilities, cleanroom operations, and process equipment used in advanced therapy manufacturing.

The role ensures maintenance & calibration works are executed safely, efficiently, and in compliance with quality, regulatory, and site reliability requirements. The individual partners closely with Engineering, Manufacturing, Facilities, Quality, Validation, Metrology, EHS, and external contractors to maintain equipment uptime, reduce unplanned downtime, and support uninterrupted clinical and commercial supply

Key Responsibilities:

• Maintenance Planning: Develop detailed work plans for preventive maintenance, corrective maintenance, predictive maintenance, calibration coordination, and reliability-based tasks for manufacturing, supply chain, lab and facility assets.

• Scheduling: Create and maintain daily, weekly, and longer-range maintenance schedules, balancing production priorities, equipment availability, labor capacity, and shutdown windows.

• CMMS Management: Manage work orders in the Computerized Maintenance Management System (CMMS), ensuring accurate asset hierarchies, task lists, labor estimates, spare parts, and maintenance history.

• Job Plan Development: Build standardized job plans with clear scope, required tools, materials, permits, lockout/tagout needs, craft labor, vendor support, and estimated durations.

• Coordination with Operations: Work closely with manufacturing, facilities, and lab stakeholders to align maintenance windows with production campaigns, aseptic processing constraints, and cleanroom access requirements.

• Technical Equipment Support: Plan maintenance activities for process and facility equipment such as HVAC systems, HEPA filtration units, air handling units, clean steam systems, RO water systems, compressed gases, freezers, incubators, biosafety cabinets, isolators, autoclaves, pass-through chambers, centrifuges, LN2 systems, refrigeration systems, pumps, valves, sensors, PLC-controlled skids, and building management systems.

• GMP Compliance: Ensure maintenance activities are planned and documented in accordance with GMP, GDP, site procedures, change control, deviation management, and data integrity requirements.

• Shutdown and Turnaround Planning: Support site shutdowns, planned outages, and major maintenance events by developing integrated schedules, sequencing tasks, and coordinating internal and external resources.

• Spare Parts and Materials Coordination: Identify required spare parts, consumables, and contractor services in advance of scheduled work; partner with warehouse, procurement, and engineering to avoid delays.

• Risk-Based Prioritization: Prioritize maintenance tasks based on safety, product impact, compliance risk, equipment criticality, and operational urgency.

• KPI Tracking: Monitor and report maintenance metrics such as schedule compliance, PM completion/compliance, backlog health, mean time between failure (MTBF), mean time to repair (MTTR), % utilization and downtime trends.

• Contractor/Vendor Coordination: Coordinate service providers and OEM technicians for specialized maintenance, ensuring proper site access, permits, training, and documentation.

• Continuous Improvement: Identify opportunities to improve maintenance effectiveness, planning accuracy, spare parts strategy, and equipment reliability through RCM, FMEA-informed maintenance, and lessons learned.

Technical Scope / Equipment Knowledge

The role should demonstrate working knowledge of maintenance planning and scheduling for equipment commonly found in cell therapy manufacturing facilities, including:

• Cleanroom infrastructure: HVAC, differential pressure control, temperature/humidity monitoring, HEPA systems, airlocks, environmental monitoring support systems, and building automation controls.

• Critical utilities: RO water, clean steam, chilled water, process gases, nitrogen, carbon dioxide, and electrical distribution systems.

• Process equipment: Biosafety cabinets, incubators, centrifuges, controlled-rate freezers, cryogenic storage systems, water baths, microscopes, and single-use support equipment.

• Cold chain and cryogenic systems: -80 freezers, LN2 freezers, cryo storage vessels, monitoring/alarm systems, and backup systems supporting chain of identity and chain of custody requirements.

• Instrumentation and controls: Sensors, transmitters, alarms, PLCs, SCADA/BMS/EMS interfaces, calibration interfaces, and automated skid packages.

• Facility systems: Fire protection, emergency power, UPS, generators, security-controlled access interfaces, and waste handling systems relevant to classified GMP spaces.

Required Qualifications

• Associate's, vocational, certificate, technical, or equivalent bachelor’s degree/diploma with equivalent experience in the related technical discipline, or equivalent combination of education and relevant experience.

• Experience in maintenance planning and scheduling within biopharmaceutical, cell therapy, gene therapy, vaccine, pharmaceutical, medical device, or other highly regulated manufacturing environments.

• Strong technical understanding of facility systems, utilities, and process equipment maintenance.

• Minimum 5 years of relevant work experience in maintenance group within a regulated environment.

• Experience using CMMS such as SAP PM / Beamex CMX, Maximo, BMRAM or equivalent.

• Knowledge of GMP, EHS, lockout/tagout, permit-to-work systems, deviation/change control awareness, and maintenance documentation practices.

• Ability to read and interpret P&IDs, equipment manuals, engineering drawings, one-line diagrams, and maintenance procedures.

• Strong coordination, organizational, and cross-functional communication skills.

• Familiarity with reliability-centered maintenance, predictive maintenance tools, and asset criticality assessments.

• Understanding of calibration coordination, commissioning/qualification interfaces, and validated systems in GMP environments.

• Certification or training in maintenance planning, project scheduling, or reliability methods is an advantage.

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