Occupancy Planner

Ford Motor • Dearborn, MI

3d • Hybrid

About The Position

This position helps drive long range space planning, develops cross building seating strategies, and guides the business through major shifts in utilization, hybrid work patterns, COG alignment, and enterprise workplace transitions. The Lead Occupancy Planner serves as a subject matter expert in the COG seating model, ME seating strategy, densification planning, and headcount to seat ratio management. The role requires strong partnership with senior business leaders, HR, Workplace Change Enablement (WCE), Facilities, Design, Trades, and program teams to drive clarity, reinforce governance, and ensure planning decisions align with enterprise priorities. The ideal candidate is highly strategic, data driven, influential at all levels, and skilled at balancing customer needs with long term portfolio and business objectives.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in Architecture, Interior Design, Real Estate, Urban Planning, Facilities Management, Business, or related field.
• 6–10+ years of occupancy planning, workplace strategy, or facilities planning experience, ideally in a complex corporate environment.
• Experience leading campus or multi-building occupancy planning.
• Strong verbal and written communication skills, with the ability to influence senior leadership.
• High proficiency with AutoCAD, IWMS/CAFM platforms, badge analytics, and Excel.
• Understanding of CAD/BIM and architectural drawing interpretation.
• Proven ability to manage ambiguity, competing priorities, and large-scale transitions.

Nice To Haves

• Experience within Ford Land or similar large corporate real estate organizations.
• Knowledge of Ford’s COG model, ME seating, hybrid workplace policies, and Dearborn portfolio.
• Experience leading teams or mentoring junior planners.

Responsibilities

• Lead multi-year occupancy strategies across large buildings or campuses, aligned with enterprise real estate strategy and hybrid workplace models.
• Oversee stacking plans, adjacency strategies, and macro-level space programming for operating groups and enterprise-wide initiatives.
• Lead scenario modeling for major reorganizations, consolidations, and growth plans.
• Translate business priorities into actionable space strategies that support agility, cost optimization, and organizational effectiveness.
• Ensure seating recommendations align with Ford Land’s flexible COG seating model, hybrid workplace guidelines, and ME seat utilization targets.
• Partner with HR and Business Leadership to reinforce policy alignment and manage exceptions.
• Evaluate and communicate impacts of assigned seating requests and ensure consistency with enterprise strategy.
• Develop and execute building rebalancing strategies, including pre renovation clear-outs, transitions, and densification related to construction phasing.
• Coordinate with Design, Construction, Trades, Facilities, and ET to ensure seamless implementation.
• Maintain high-quality data in Ford’s IWMS/CAFM system.
• Lead analysis of headcount forecasts, badge activity, EOW utilization data, and attendance trends to drive planning decisions.
• Create executive level insights and summaries for senior leadership.
• Act as a strategic partner to senior leaders across all business units and centralized corporate functions.
• Support executive discussions on seating strategy, adjacency needs, capacity risks, and long term portfolio planning.
• Guide customers through decision-making with clear rationale rooted in data, governance, and enterprise priorities.
• Lead governance reviews for seating exceptions, dedicated room requests, space allocations, and assigned seating escalations.
• Uphold clean desk policies, ME seating principles, and equitable space distribution across COGs.
• Prioritize furniture and asset allocation based on portfolio needs, lifecycle conditions, and enterprise priorities
• Provide coaching, mentoring, and review for Occupancy Planners and Analysts to ensure consistency and accuracy.
• Champion planning best practices across the team and drive continuous improvement in process and communication.

Benefits

• Immediate medical, dental, vision and prescription drug coverage
• Flexible family care days, paid parental leave, new parent ramp-up programs, subsidized back-up child care and more
• Family building benefits including adoption and surrogacy expense reimbursement, fertility treatments, and more
• Vehicle discount program for employees and family members and management leases
• Tuition assistance
• Established and active employee resource groups
• Paid time off for individual and team community service
• A generous schedule of paid holidays, including the week between Christmas and New Year’s Day
• Paid time off and the option to purchase additional vacation time.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Mid Level