Interim National Distribution Manager
Ref: 313027B
Northamptonshire, UK
£500 per day
- Contract
- Warehouse Transformation
- 3PL Fulfilment
- Lean Process Improvement
About the candidate
An experienced interim warehousing and distribution specialist with a strong track record of stepping into fast-moving operations, stabilising performance and delivering measurable improvements quickly. They have worked across retail, e-commerce, FMCG, healthcare, food and 3PL environments, with exposure to automated, multi-temperature and multi-client operations.
They are confident leading underperforming teams, improving warehouse productivity, supporting site start-ups and closures, and embedding practical process improvements that stick. With Lean Six Sigma Green Belt and IOSH Managing Safely qualifications, they bring a hands-on, improvement-led approach to distribution operations.
What makes them great?
- Delivers fast performance improvement: Improved pick productivity by around 65% in four months, increased warehouse output by around 70% in three months and reduced inbound SLA failures by close to 30% through workflow redesign and stronger floor leadership.
- Strong commercial impact: Reduced stock loss from approximately £1.1m to around £45k, delivered roughly £185k in annual packaging savings and achieved a favourable budget variance of approximately £1.1m while managing a £13m cost base.
- Proven peak and service recovery experience: Helped deliver more than 250k units during a major peak period, brought customer delivery wait times back from 10 days to a 24-hour SLA, and improved pick accuracy from 86% to 99% in two months.
Areas of expertise
- Warehouse and distribution operations: Experienced across pick, pack, rework, returns, goods-in, cross-dock and fulfilment operations, including large-scale distribution centres of up to around 666k sq ft.
- Operational transformation: Skilled in identifying performance gaps, redesigning workflows, improving pick sequencing and embedding Lean methods such as 5S to lift productivity and service levels.
- Interim leadership: Comfortable joining businesses at pace, coaching management teams, improving workforce engagement and restoring operational control during peaks, start-ups and turnaround projects.