Head of Product Design and Development - Crewe

at  Unipart Rail

ESSENTIAL CRITERIA

• Educated to a degree level or equivalent in an Engineering discipline (electronics or software development)
• Chartered Engineer status with a relevant professional body
• Demonstrable experience in leading product development in a safety critical industry.
• Demonstrable Project Management, people management and cost management experience.
• In depth experience / knowledge of rail industry standards, design for reliability and electronic product safety regulations
• Excellent communication skills and able to build relationships with teams, suppliers and customers.
• Ability to work at Managerial level within the organisation.
• Able to create and deliver to strategic technical and technology development plans and processes.
• Management of internal and external stakeholders and associated development projects.
• Product safety and reliability knowledge EN 50126, EN 50716 (EN 50128), EN 50129
• Understanding and knowledge of UKCA/CE and UK DoC/DoC declaration requirements

As the Head of Design and Development, your position demands proactive involvement in shaping our design engineering operations with a particular focus on driving complex and technical design and development projects to time, cost and quality. You are entrusted with the crucial task of leading a team of electronic, software, mechanical and safety engineers to achieve design deliverables in accordance with industry standards and national interoperability regulations.
Your leadership extends to ensuring the seamless execution of these initiatives which are geared towards the creation of industry critical products, delivering safe and reliable operations to your customers for decades to come. To achieve this, you’ll demonstrate a continued commitment to design excellence and reliability, achieved through strong process control and project governance.
Your role will also provide crucial support, not limited to customer enquiries, spanning new product requests, technical investigations, audits, bids/tenders, supplier support and manufacturing assistance.
As a leader within your department’s decision making, and a technical expert in your field, you will take responsibility for the safety and development of a small team of multi-disciplined engineers reporting directly to you. You will also be responsible for ensuring your team’s design outputs are compliant to all technical, client and safety requirements, and all applicable regulatory obligations. The products you will deliver are electronic devices, some of which encompass safety critical embedded software (C+ and C++), with stringent mechanical and environmental requirements.

Responsibilities include (but are not limited to):

• Responsible for your direct report’s competency, safety and development
• Responsible for design compliance to applicable standards, processes and regulatory obligations
• Responsible for your project deliverable to time, cost and quality (as defined by the Head of Engineering)
• Management of engineering and design activities, to achieve internal and external client satisfaction.