Transportation Analyst
UFP Industries · Grand Rapids
Job Summary
The Transportation Analyst is responsible for supporting transportation pricing, profitability, operational performance, and strategic decision-making through analysis, investigation, and business insight generation. This role serves as a key resource for evaluating transportation costs, pricing structures, operational opportunities, and business risks. The ideal candidate is highly adaptable, naturally curious, capable of connecting information from multiple sources, and able to develop meaningful conclusions with limited direction. The Transportation Analyst is expected to independently validate information, identify discrepancies, challenge assumptions, and provide actionable recommendations that improve business performance.
Principal Duties and Responsibilities
- Conduct ad hoc analysis to support operational, financial, pricing, fleet, and strategic business decisions.
- Evaluate transportation costs, profitability, utilization, pricing structures, and operational performance to identify opportunities and risks.
- Analyze transportation scenarios involving private fleet, dedicated operations, brokerage, contract carriage, and common carrier solutions.
- Develop a strong understanding of transportation pricing methodologies, freight cost structures, and profitability drivers.
- Validate reports, metrics, assumptions, and business results through independent review and cross-checking methodologies.
- Identify discrepancies, anomalies, data integrity concerns, and process gaps before information is distributed or relied upon for decision-making.
- Establish practical audit controls and validation processes to improve confidence in transportation data and business reporting.
- Investigate business questions, determine root causes, and develop data-supported recommendations with limited direction.
- Connect information from multiple sources to identify patterns, relationships, risks, and opportunities that may not be immediately apparent.
- Partner with operations, pricing, fleet, finance, sales, and leadership teams to support transportation initiatives and business objectives.
- Identify opportunities to improve operational processes, reporting accuracy, pricing effectiveness, and organizational efficiency.
- Support special projects, network evaluations, profitability reviews, growth initiatives, and continuous improvement efforts.
Qualifications
- Bachelor's degree in Supply Chain, Logistics, Transportation, Business, Finance, Economics, Analytics, or a related field preferred.
- 2-5 years of experience in transportation, logistics, freight pricing, operations, finance, or business analytics.
- Strong understanding of transportation operations, pricing structures, freight cost drivers, and profitability concepts.
- Demonstrated ability to perform investigative and ad hoc analysis to support business decisions.
- Experience identifying errors, validating results, and developing methods to audit and verify information accuracy.
- Strong proficiency in Microsoft Excel and other business analysis tools.
- Ability to quickly learn new concepts, systems, business models, and operational processes.
- Strong analytical, problem-solving, and critical-thinking skills.
- Ability to work independently, manage multiple priorities, and thrive in ambiguous environments.
- Exceptional attention to detail with the ability to understand broader business implications.
The Company is an Equal Opportunity Employer.