As the Principal Quality Engineer - Body Structures & Chassis (Technical Quality), you will be responsible for Body Structures and Chassis Fault Analysis and Customer Evaluation activities across the entire vehicle life cycle. This will require you to manage all quality related activities as well as working across the technical quality and wider quality functions in a matrix arrangement to deliver the required business objectives. Please note this is a 24 month FTC role.
Core Functions
* Continuous development of the quality mindset in the business to evolve the ever-changing business requirements.
* Management and steering of quality concern countermeasures and lessons learned.
* Management of quality related topics through the advance phases including development vehicle shakedown and all mileage accumulation and early‑stage problem identification.
* Management, negotiation and liaison of all budget and headcount requirements for project related change content, ensuring adequate project budget and Purchase Order (PO) coverage is in place.
* The role relies upon excellent interpersonal and communication skills with a key attribute being the ability to challenge, persuade, convince, and guide with assertion, at all levels ensuring that governance and controls are robust and applied to all aspects of quality during the programme development process enabling growth and change in a controlled and standardised way. This includes the development of new processes and lessons learnt (LeLe).
Responsibilities
* Manage all Body Structures & Chassis related quality concerns (QCRs) across all new model and series programmes, acting as the ‘voice of the customer’ including customer usage, problem validation, mileage accumulation, test/usage planning, budget analysis, fault identification and allocation.
* Drive lessons learned to deliver improvement into Design Failure Mode & Effect Analysis (DFMEA), Design for Manufacture (DFM) and part supply related concerns with the function group.
* Ensure a robust approach is taken to identify the root cause of issues, through to successful resolution, using the Practical Problem Solving (PPS) process.
* Attend Q‑Technical Meetings for every programme in development and support the Q‑Programme team in QCR resolution together with the QCR stakeholders.
* Manage and drive the vehicle quality attribute review together with the Body Structures & Chassis engineering teams, Supplier Quality Development (SQD) and manufacturing launch team(s).
* Accountable for vehicle evaluation, short and long‑term mileage test plan development together with the Principal Vehicle Evaluation Engineer, ensuring all identified issues are input into the respective fault management system and monitored through to closure.
* Accountable for the delivery of the Production Validation Unit (PVU) and Debug process together with the Principal Vehicle Evaluation Engineer.
* Prepare project‑specific activity plans and reports that deliver the desired quality level at launch.
* Manage the continuous improvement processes for Body Structures & Chassis quality related items.
What You’ll Bring (Qualifications & Experience)
* Degree qualified in Mechanical or Automotive Engineering, or equivalent industry experience.
* New product and series development experience in the Automotive Industry for a minimum of seven years.
* 8D or Practical Problem Solving (PPS) – demonstratable experience of problem‑solving techniques and the tools used.
* Experience in either Body Structures or Chassis development (preferably both) and/or quality related role.
* Experience in Design Failure Mode and Effect Analysis (DFMEA) process and understanding of potential risks associated with design of components.
* Launch of low volume vehicles into the production environment.
* Experience of driving cars within a development environment (desirable).
* Low volume, high value vehicle fleet management experience.
* Understanding of Statistical Process Control (SPC), statistics and process capabilities.
* People management experience would be advantageous, but not critical.
* Experience of working in a matrix environment.
* Methodical approach to work with strong analytical skills.
Other Traits
* Self‑starter capable of using initiative.
* Ability to act under pressure with calmness, clarity of thought and decisive authority.
* Willingness to travel to off‑site development facilities within the UK and throughout Europe, requiring a flexible approach to travel and working hours.
* Determination to drive forward the business to ‘Best in Class’ performance standards in line with brand expectations.
* Lateral thinker able to think outside of the box to make structured and objective decisions.
* Excellent communication skills, both written and verbal, and excellent attention to detail.
Benefits
* Structured career development framework
* 25 days’ holiday, plus bank holiday. Annual buy & sell up to five days
* Enhanced company pension scheme
* Discretionary annual bonus award
* Private medical insurance and health cash plan
* Life assurance benefit
* Ability to apply for a sabbatical of up to one year after only two years’ service
* Benefits you can adapt to your lifestyle, such as discounted shopping
* Generous parental leave policies
* A range of wellbeing initiatives, such as employee assistance programme and free financial & mortgage advice
McLaren Automotive exists to create breath‑taking performance road cars. We work in a fast‑paced environment and trust a culture of continuous improvement. We are committed to equal opportunity for all. Diversity, Equality and Inclusion is at the heart of our impact, it drives our innovation and enables us to truly create something special. Join us on our journey.
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