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Skills employers ask for in operations jobs in manufacturing

In 11,630 operations jobs in manufacturing in the SkillDrift job index, the most requested skill is Inventory management, named in 12.6% of postings. Safety compliance follows at 8.9%, then Vendor management at 7.7%.

Based on 11,630 job postings in the SkillDrift job index, read on 1 October 2026.

Most requested

The 8 skills named most often

Each share is the part of all operations jobs in manufacturing that name the skill. One posting usually names several skills, so the shares add up to more than 100%.

  1. 1Inventory management12.6%1,463 of 11,630 postings
  2. 2Safety compliance8.9%1,039 of 11,630 postings
  3. 3Vendor management7.7%892 of 11,630 postings
  4. 4Excel7.4%863 of 11,630 postings
  5. 5MS Excel7.2%836 of 11,630 postings
  6. 6Procurement6.7%779 of 11,630 postings
  7. 7Project management6.3%727 of 11,630 postings
  8. 8Quality control6%700 of 11,630 postings

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How to read this

Where these numbers come from

The SkillDrift job index collects live job postings and reads the skills each one asks for. This page counts the postings in the operations role group within the manufacturing industry, and shows the share that name each skill. Skills appear as employers write them, so close variants such as Excel and MS Excel can both appear, because a posting may use either. The page is refreshed from the index, and the date above shows the last read.

FAQ

Questions people ask

What is the most requested skill in operations jobs in manufacturing?

Inventory management. It is named in 12.6% of the 11,630 operations jobs in manufacturing in the SkillDrift job index on 1 October 2026.

How many job postings is this based on?

11,630 postings, read from the SkillDrift job index on 1 October 2026. Each share is the number of postings that name the skill, divided by all postings in this group.

Further reading

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