Terminal Manager - Freight Forwarding
Forward Air · Los Angeles
Terminal Manager
Compensation: $175,000 - 190,000 Annually
The Terminal Manager is responsible for leading all aspects of a high-volume domestic freight forwarding operation. This role provides strategic and day‑to‑day leadership to ensure safe, compliant, and efficient movement of freight from inbound receipt through final delivery. The Terminal Manager ensures operational performance aligns with contractual, service, financial, and regulatory commitments across all supported modes. They drive workforce planning, capacity management, cost control, and terminal productivity through strong operational discipline and data‑driven decision‑making. They partner with transportation providers, carriers, customers, and internal teams to ensure seamless handoffs and service delivery.
Responsibilities
- Lead all activity across the terminal’s domestic freight forwarding operations.
- Ensure service, financial, safety, quality, and regulatory requirements are met across all transportation modes.
- Coach operations and support teams to drive consistent execution, operational discipline, and process accuracy.
- Own terminal P&L performance, including labor, variable costs, period expenses, and cost-to-serve across modes.
- Lead workforce planning, volume forecasting, transportation capacity alignment, and cross‑mode resource allocation based on network and customer demand.
- Monitor terminal operational and financial performance, identify variances, and implement corrective actions.
- Manage terminal capital expenditures tied to approved investments, terminal improvements, and handling needs.
- Sponsor and lead initiatives that improve productivity, quality, velocity, safety, and cost performance.
- Establish and manage terminal KPIs aligned with safety, regulatory compliance, on‑time performance, mode accuracy, cost, and productivity.
- Lead regular operational, transportation, and performance reviews to assess results and identify improvement opportunities.
- Proactively manage employee relations through communication, coaching, performance feedback, and team development.
- Ensure robust safety practices and full compliance with DOT, OSHA, TSA, FMC, IATA, rail, and other mode-specific regulations.
- Collaborate with carriers, drayage providers, freight forwarders, brokers, linehaul partners, and regulatory authorities to ensure smooth operations.
- Support and promote continuous improvement methodologies using data, structured problem-solving, and transportation analytics.
- All other duties as assigned to meet evolving business needs.
Qualifications
- Education: Undergraduate degree in Supply Chain Management, Business, Transportation, Logistics, or a related field preferred; High School Diploma or GED/equivalent required.
- Certification/Licensure: Valid forklift certification/licensure (or ability to obtain before operating equipment) required, including operation of applicable material handling equipment (MHE) such as sit-down/stand-up forklifts, reach trucks, order pickers, pallet riders, or other specialized MHE as required by the site. Additional equipment certifications may be required depending on facility needs.
- Training in Lean, Six Sigma, DOT compliance, IATA/IMDG familiarity, or similar is preferred.
- Experience: 5+ years of leadership experience in domestic freight forwarding, 3PL, contract logistics, or operational environments involving ground, air, ocean, or rail.
- Strong working knowledge of transportation processes, carrier operations, freight flow management, and terminal/linehaul coordination.
- Strong functional understanding of TMS, WMS, ERP (McLeod, SAP, Oracle, etc.), and reporting/data tools.
- Proven ability to manage operational KPIs, labor planning, transportation capacity, and cost performance.
- Experience developing and using dashboards, scorecards, and transportation KPI reporting to manage terminal performance.
- Ability to create, track, and interpret safety, quality, delivery, cost, and productivity metrics across multiple transportation modes.
- Demonstrated discretion and confidentiality in handling and protecting sensitive information.
- Technical: Proficient with common office technologies, including Windows PCs, Microsoft O365 (Outlook, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, etc.) and web conferencing (Teams, Zoom, Webex, etc.).
- Environment: Comfort commuting to/from and working in a 100% on-site setting (listed in this posting), with travel for related meetings/events.
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The Terminal Manager is responsible for leading all aspects of a high-volume domestic freight forwarding operation. This role provides strategic and day‑to‑day leadership to ensure safe, compliant, and efficient movement of freight from inbound receipt through final delivery. The Terminal Manager ensures operational performance aligns with contractual, service, financial, and regulatory commitments across all supported modes. They drive workforce planning, capacity management, cost control, and terminal productivity through strong operational discipline and data‑driven decision‑making. They partner with transportation providers, carriers, customers, and internal teams to ensure seamless handoffs and service delivery.More jobs at Forward Air · Warehouse & Logistics jobs in Los Angeles