Director, Customer Engineering (CPE)

Company: GILLIG
Location: Livermore
Posted on: August 7, 2022

Job Description:

As the leading transit bus manufacturer in the United States, GILLIG buses play a critical role in the environmental and social initiatives in communities across our nation. GILLIG is on the forefront in the transition to zero-emission vehicles and has an unmatched reputation in the industry for quality, reliability, durability, service, and support. From initial design through final assembly, each GILLIG bus is designed and built in Livermore, CA.

We are looking for an experienced Engineering leader who desires to play a key role on a winning organization, is passionate about building and leading a great team, has an unrelenting drive for excellence, is a great problem solver and has a strong thirst to lead product and process improvement.

WHY GILLIG

• Leader in environmentally friendly mobility solutions including battery electric, hybrid electric, near-zero CNG and clean diesel transit buses.
• Renowned for its inclusive team/family-oriented culture
• Stable, successful, and growing organization - a Bay Area business for over 132 years!
• Flexible schedules (*depending on project needs)
• Excellent compensation including company paid medical premiums, generous retirement plan and other comprehensive benefits.
  
  About The Role
  
  The mission of the Customer Engineering group is to deliver robust, fleet-specific designs required for each of our customers' operational needs. Customer Engineering has technical responsibility from the initial customer bid through vehicle delivery, encompassing bid team support, translation of requested features and functionality into parts, design & release of components/systems, validation support, and implementation into production.
  
  Reporting to the Senior Director of Current Product Engineering, and with five direct reports, you will be responsible for building out and leading a multi-disciplinary engineering team of approximately 85 design engineers and BOM technicians to ensure timely and accurate bid through vehicle delivery. You will be a critical strategic thought partner alongside cross-departmental stakeholders in planning the product roadmap and driving customer specific variants of GILLIG current production bus models.
  
  You will be responsible for developing and setting strategies and objectives for your team supporting company and departmental goals, while driving initiatives to meet those goals. You will lead your team in problem solving, ensuring thorough and timely designs, and will be a key contributor to evolution and implementation of design tools including NX, Zuken E3 and Team Center. A successful candidate will possess strong leadership and change management skills and thrives in a collaborative dynamic environment.
  
  As the Director, you will be responsible for the engineering required to deliver safe, robust, serviceable, and customized transit buses to our established and growing customer base. Many designs are adapted from existing product or precedence, others necessitate specific clean-sheet design, test, and validation. Ongoing collaboration with internal engineering managers, supervisors, and individual contributors as well as external sales, supply chain, and manufacturing partners will be key to the success of this role.
  
  Basic Qualifications
  
  • BSEE or BSME required, MS preferred
  • 12+ years of progressive engineering experience
  • 7+ years of experience managing small to mid-sized (20+) design engineering staff
  • Expert communication skills to lead and influence
  • Vision to drive strategies and process improvements with a proven ability to execute
  • Proven analytical skills and solution-driven thinking to transform processes within unestablished or evolving organization
  • Fluency in resolving coincident requirements such as quality, cost-reduction, customer preference, manufacturability and time-to-market
  • Ability to read and understand complex engineering drawings
  • Comfort and experience with change management and ability to navigate those challenges to optimize the organization
    
    Other Qualifications
    
    • Expert knowledge of heavy-duty vehicle industry standards, regulations, and guidelines such as FMVSS, ADA, APTA Bus Procurement Guidelines, SAE HD vehicle standards, NFPA, and NEC
    • You have familiarity with and a willingness to work around a product with virtually endless option content while maximizing design reuse.
    • Working experience using a PLM system such as Siemens Team Center
    • You have an affinity towards working as part of a team in a fast-paced environment
      
      GILLIG is an equal employment opportunity and affirmative action employer.

Keywords: GILLIG, Livermore , Director, Customer Engineering (CPE), Executive , Livermore, California