Warehouse Operations interview prep.

Behavioural questions to expect

1. Walk me through your background + your path into warehouse / fulfillment operations.
2. Tell me about a shift, area, or site you've owned end-to-end on the floor.
3. Why warehouse operations vs transportation, planning, or commercial roles?
4. Why fulfillment / DC ops specifically vs transportation ops or network planning?
5. Why the firm?
6. What's your read on our site network + customer footprint?
7. Tell me what you understand about our automation + safety posture.
8. Walk me through a time you lifted productivity - UPH, lines / hour, or dock-to-stock - on a site or area.

Technical concepts to master

• WMS, slotting + wave strategy

  WMS (Warehouse Management System) · Slotting · Wave + batch + cluster picking · Task interleaving · Cycle count + inventory accuracy

• Labor planning + productivity

  Labor management system (LMS) · Span of control + supervisor ratio · Flex labor + agency strategy · Attrition + retention · Engineered labor standards

• Safety + OSHA fundamentals

  OSHA TRIR + DART · Hierarchy of controls · PIT (Powered Industrial Truck) program · Behaviour-based safety + near-miss reporting · Ergonomics + repetitive-motion

• Inbound + outbound flow fundamentals

  Receiving + ASN · Putaway + replenishment · Picking · Packing + value-add · Shipping + carrier cut-offs

Practical drills

• Your e-com FC needs to ship 30,000 units / day at peak vs 12,000 / day at baseline. Average picker UPH is 90, packer UPH is 60. Shifts are 8 hours productive. Walk me through your labor build, identify the bottleneck, and tell me how many flex labor heads to add. Show your numbers.
• A 400-associate e-com FC has seen picker UPH drop from 110 to 85 over 6 weeks. OTIF is slipping, overtime is up 30%. The site general manager has asked you to diagnose + fix in 4 weeks. Walk me through your approach.
• You're the site general manager of a 1M sq ft e-com FC handling 80,000 units / day baseline, peaking to 250,000 / day in November + December. You have 6 weeks to plan. Walk me through your peak planning playbook.

Smart-question anchors

• Site network + customer mix - where the ops team's focus areas + growth are likely
• Automation + WMS maturity - AS/RS, AMRs, GTP, conveyor + sortation, WMS standard + recent investments
• Safety posture + culture - TRIR / DART trend, named programs, OSHA history, leading-indicator focus
• Labor model - union vs non-union, wage band, attrition reality, peak hiring playbook, retention programs
• KPI scorecard + cadence - daily / weekly / monthly KPIs the operating leader is accountable for

Sourced from

MHI (Material Handling Institute) + Modern Materials Handling magazine · WERC (Warehousing Education and Research Council) annual DC Measures Survey · OSHA Warehousing + DC standards (29 CFR 1910.178 PIT + 1904 recordkeeping) · Supply Chain Dive + DC Velocity + Logistics Management trade press · Gartner Magic Quadrant for Warehouse Management Systems + Supply Chain research