Multi-Terminal Gate-and-Rail Recovery Leader

The mandate

The operating group runs three container terminals, each of which currently optimises its own yard and vessel plan independently. This creates misalignment: boxes are requested at the wrong terminal, grounded priorities can exceed train capacity, depot returns compete with laden evacuation and customers receive conflicting collection windows. The group lacks one intermodal control function that can coordinate terminal plans, truck appointments, grounded-box priorities and inland recovery decisions across all three facilities to ensure the network can withstand operational shocks without exporting queues to roads and inland ramps.

This nine-month intermodal command must be staffed inside two weeks. Its first 30 days produce a reconciled population across laden, empty, rail, truck, hold and exception states while the executive directs the remaining backlog recovery. Common gate-release and rail-build rules must be operating at all three terminals by month three. Two planned disruption simulations and one peak cycle then test the model, leaving the last six weeks for the permanent intermodal director to assume authority, measures and counterparty routines.

Acceptance requires a daily unit-level balance connecting vessel discharge, yard position, customs or commercial status, rail allocation, grounded availability, truck appointment, depot capacity and inland receipt. For eight consecutive weeks, priority rail departure adherence must exceed 90%, median truck turn time remain below 55 minutes, import dwell stay within the board's segment thresholds and no overflow move be lost between terminal and depot custody. Improvement cannot come from suppressing valid appointments, excluding held boxes or diverting cost beyond the measured boundary.

The interim may set common priorities across the three company terminals, reserve gate and lift capacity, redirect eligible boxes within approved customer and customs rules, commission temporary depot or drayage capacity, and approve recovery expenditure up to CAD 7 million. Railways retain network, locomotive, crew and train acceptance; masters and vessel planners retain safe vessel operations; authorities retain release and inspection; labour arrangements remain with authorised leaders; and the chief operating officer approves structural service or capital commitments.

Collective bargaining, rail-network dispatch, terminal-concession policy, customs adjudication, carrier tariff negotiation and permanent automation procurement are outside scope. The mandate is broader than correcting congestion inside one yard: it must govern hand-offs among three terminals, two rail interfaces, road gates, depots and inland destinations. Technology teams may adapt decision support, but the leader cannot disguise missing physical capacity or disputed commercial priority inside an algorithm.

Why this seat is open

The operating group has strong individual terminal leaders but no executive owns an import unit from discharge through the chosen inland hand-off. The rail stoppage exposed contradictory priorities and unpriced overflow between businesses, while appointing one terminal leader over peers would compromise ongoing performance. A time-bound recovery office is needed until common authority and a permanent intermodal seat are embedded.

What you will own

• Reconcile laden, empty, rail, truck, customs-hold, grounded and depot populations to one daily unit-level operating balance.
• Command backlog evacuation without allowing vessel discharge, gate release or empty returns to recreate an unseen queue elsewhere.
• Establish common rail-build, grounded-priority, truck-appointment and overflow rules across all three terminals.
• Integrate railway acceptance, labour windows, lift capacity, chassis, depot space and inland receipt before promising recovery volume.
• Exercise another rail interruption and a terminal outage while measuring road, yard, customer and inland consequences end to end.
• Publish dwell, train, gate, custody and recovery-cost measures with exclusions and boundary transfers plainly reconciled.
• Induct the permanent director through live peak decisions, counterparty routines, unresolved constraints and the next simulation.

Candidate qualifications

• Held executive container-terminal or intermodal-network authority spanning rail, gate, yard and inland operating interfaces.
• Has recovered multiple terminals after a rail, labour, weather or infrastructure stoppage without shifting invisible congestion downstream.
• Understands vessel discharge, grounded boxes, train build, appointments, chassis, depots, holds and inland receipt as one flow.
• Can secure railway and trucking commitments while respecting their separate network, labour, safety and commercial authority.
• Has exposed apparently improved dwell or turn-time metrics that depended on suppressed demand or changed measurement boundaries.
• Completed a permanent handover with common multi-terminal rules surviving peak volume and a second disruption cycle.