Director Network Strategy & Performance

Position Summary: Atlas Air is seeking a highly analytical, strategically minded leader to serve as a key partner to the Staff Vice President of Network Planning in driving the performance, economics, and evolution of the airline's global network.

This role sits at the intersection of strategy, operations, finance, and technology. The successful candidate will be responsible for identifying opportunities to improve aircraft productivity, service reliability, capacity utilization, profitability, and planning effectiveness across the enterprise. Working across Commercial, Operations, Maintenance, Crew, Finance, and Technology organizations, this individual will help shape how the airline makes decisions, allocates resources, and optimizes performance.

The role serves as the analytical and strategic engine behind network performance improvement, translating complex operational and commercial challenges into actionable recommendations and measurable business outcomes.

The ideal candidate combines structured problem-solving skills, strong analytical capabilities, and practical business judgment. They are equally comfortable evaluating a customer-specific performance issue, developing a fleet allocation recommendation, supporting a business development opportunity, or leading a transformation initiative that improves how the airline plans and operates. They are not only able to identify opportunities, but also build consensus, navigate complexity, and drive implementation to deliver measurable results.

Major Job Accountabilities:

Network Performance & Economics

• Analyze performance across customers, contracts, aircraft, fleets, routes, business units, and the overall network.
• Identify opportunities to improve aircraft utilization, service reliability, cost efficiency, profitability, and network productivity.
• Develop performance management frameworks and key metrics to evaluate network effectiveness.
• Conduct root-cause analyses of operational and commercial performance gaps and develop actionable improvement plans.
• Create executive-level analyses, business cases, and recommendations to support decision-making.
• Quantify trade-offs between revenue, utilization, reliability, cost, and operational complexity.

Strategic Network Optimization

• Evaluate network design alternatives and recommend opportunities to improve schedule efficiency and asset productivity.
• Support fleet allocation, spare aircraft strategy, capacity planning, and long-term network development decisions.
• Assess customer and contract performance and recommend changes that align incentives and improve operational and economic outcomes.
• Support commercial and business development initiatives through scenario analysis and strategic evaluation.
• Identify opportunities to better align network design with evolving customer demand and market conditions.
• Drive analytical reviews of network assumptions, planning methodologies, and operating parameters.

Integrated Airline Planning

• Partner across Commercial, Operations, Maintenance, Crew, Finance, and Technology organizations to ensure planning decisions reflect enterprise-wide objectives and constraints.
• Support the development of a more integrated planning model that improves coordination across functions and planning horizons.
• Evaluate cross-functional trade-offs and facilitate decision-making among competing priorities.
• Develop frameworks that improve visibility into capacity, resource constraints, and operational risk.

Transformation & Continuous Improvement

• Identify opportunities and lead initiatives to simplify, standardize, automate, and improve planning processes.
• Develop future-state planning methodologies, governance processes, and performance management frameworks.
• Serve as a catalyst for data-driven decision-making and continuous improvement across planning functions.
• Support organizational transformation efforts designed to improve scalability, consistency, and operational performance.

Technology & Analytics Partnership

• Act as the business owner and subject matter expert for network planning analytics and optimization initiatives.
• Partner with Data Science and Technology organizations to develop decision-support tools, optimization capabilities, and planning systems.
• Define business problems and analytical priorities that create measurable business value, translate operational and commercial requirements into business requirements for technology and analytics teams.
• Evaluate analytical outputs and ensure recommendations align with business objectives and operational realities.
• Drive adoption and effective use of new analytical tools and planning capabilities.

Leadership & Influence

• Foster a culture of analytical rigor, accountability, and continuous improvement.
• Challenge conventional thinking and champion innovative approaches to complex business problems.
• Lead cross-functional initiatives from concept through implementation.
• Influence stakeholders at all levels of the organization.

Qualifications:

Required

• Bachelor's degree in Business, Engineering, Operations Research, Economics, Aviation Management, Mathematics, or a related quantitative discipline.
• MBA or equivalent advanced degree preferred.
• 8+ years of professional experience in strategy consulting, airline planning, transportation, logistics, operations, or other complex network-based industries.
• Demonstrated experience solving complex business problems using structured analytical approaches.
• Strong quantitative skills and experience working with large datasets to support business decisions.
• Exceptional communication and presentation skills with the ability to influence senior leaders.
• Proven ability to lead cross-functional initiatives in dynamic and ambiguous environments.
• Strong business acumen and ability to balance commercial, operational, and financial objectives.

Preferred

• Experience in airline network planning, airline operations, aviation strategy, transportation, logistics, or asset-intensive industries.
• Experience supporting organizational transformation, process redesign, or technology-enabled business improvement initiatives.
• Familiarity with optimization, simulation, forecasting, and decision-support methodologies.
• Experience partnering with analytics, data science, or technology teams to develop business solutions.