Engineering & Operations Development Specialist

Role Purpose

The Engineering & Operations Development Specialist is a rotational, learning-oriented role intended to build leadership readiness while providing meaningful capacity to the Engineering and Manufacturing organizations. The individual will spend approximately 70% of their time supporting Engineering Department priorities and 30% embedded with Manufacturing to develop operating knowledge, provide shift-support coverage, and build readiness to serve as backup support when shift supervision coverage is needed. Within Engineering, this role will support cost-reduction projects and performance-excellence initiatives, digital/AI implementation efforts, equipment and manufacturing-data accuracy improvements, and project coordination. In Manufacturing, the role will learn frontline operating systems, support communication and training activities, and provide supplemental leadership support under the direction of Manufacturing leadership.

Key Responsibilities

• Support execution of cost-reduction, productivity, capacity, and improvement projects, including identifying, validating, and implementing cost-saving opportunities.
• Support Performance Excellence, Kaizen, problem-solving, standard-work, visual-management, and waste-reduction activities, and participate in root-cause analysis and corrective actions for equipment, process, data, and operational issues.
• Assist in improving the accuracy, accessibility, and usability of equipment and process data from MES, OSI PI, and related manufacturing systems, and support implementation and adoption of approved AI, automation, and digital tools within the facility.
• Complete a structured manufacturing immersion plan covering shift exposure, process-area learning, safety practices, quality systems, production-control routines, and daily-management processes, while observing and learning supervisory responsibilities, including safety leadership, staffing coordination, production prioritization, quality response, and employee communication.
• Provide supplemental support to shift supervisors and section leaders during absences, peak workload periods, training events, improvement activities, or other identified business needs, including cross-shift communication, handoffs, escalation tracking, action-item closure, and daily accountability routines.
• Assist with operator training coordination, training-matrix updates, procedure adherence, and onboarding activities, and lead or support small-scale operational improvement efforts in partnership with Manufacturing leadership.
• Maintain clear role boundaries: formal people-management decisions, discipline, performance management, and independent shift-supervisor authority remain with the designated supervisor unless formally assigned. 

Experiences/Education - Required

• Bachelor’s degree in technical discipline
• 1-5 years plus in manufacturing engineering or similar environment 
• Demonstrated interest in manufacturing operations, engineering, continuous improvement, and leadership development.
• Strong analytical, organizational, communication, and problem-solving skills.
• Ability to work effectively across engineering, manufacturing, maintenance, quality, IT/OT, and leadership teams.
• Ability and willingness to work in a manufacturing environment, including periodic off-shift exposure as required for the development plan and business need.

Experiences/Education - Desired

• Knowledge with Lean, Six Sigma, Kaizen, structured problem solving, or project management.
• Familiarity with manufacturing data systems, MES, OSI PI, SQL, Power BI, Tableau, Python, or similar analytical and visualization tools.
• Prior manufacturing, military, operations leadership, internship, co-op, or project-based experience.

Success Measures:

• Completion of a defined manufacturing immersion and shift-supervision readiness plan.
• Demonstrated capability to provide effective supplemental shift and section support.
• Timely delivery of assigned project milestones and action items.
• Measurable contributions to cost, productivity, data quality, process performance, safety, quality, or employee capability.
• Improved data accuracy, reporting reliability, or usability for identified MES/OSI PI data sets.