Engineering and Maintenance Director

ASSISTANT PLANT DIRECTOR - Engineering & Maintenance

JOB SUMMARY
This position is responsible for reinforcing a culture of safety, quality, and continuous improvement while delivering best-in-class performance in a fast-paced Tier 1 automotive environment. The role heavily demands a strong technical focus, overseeing advanced manufacturing engineering projects and complex plant maintenance systems to maximize equipment effectiveness and ensure seamless serial production. 
DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES
1. Support overall plant operations across production, maintenance, quality, logistics, and engineering to achieve targeted operational excellence.
2. Drive performance against key metrics, including safety, quality, cost, delivery, equipment uptime (OEE), and employee engagement.
3. Champion Gestamp’s safety-first culture and ensure full compliance with all regulatory, environmental, and corporate standards.
4. Lead continuous improvement initiatives aligned with the Gestamp Production System (GPS), Lean Manufacturing, and Industry 4.0 Smart Factory standards (predictive maintenance, data-driven optimization).
5. Ensure strict adherence to customer requirements, IATF 16949 standards, and Gestamp quality systems for Body-in-White (BiW) and chassis components.
6. Oversee Manufacturing & Tooling Engineering by partnering with program management to manage successful product launches (APQP/PPAP), optimize stamping dies, and refine multi-step hot mechanical or servo press sequences.
7. Direct Advanced Plant Maintenance systems, implementing rigorous preventive and predictive maintenance strategies for high-tonnage cold stamping presses, hot stamping lines (furnaces and quenching dies), and automated robotic welding cells.
8. Manage tool & die reliability programs, tracking die wear, optimizing engineering changes, and ensuring the die shop is equipped to rapidly troubleshoot and repair complex progressive and transfer tooling.
9. Support financial performance through scrap reduction strategies, energy efficiency tracking, maintenance cost control, and strategic capital expenditure (CapEx) engineering projects.
10. Develop, mentor, and strengthen leadership capabilities within the engineering, maintenance, and production teams to build deep technical expertise.
EDUCATION AND EXPERIENCE
Bachelor’s degree in Engineering (Mechanical, Manufacturing, Electrical, Industrial, or Metallurgy), Business, or related technical field.
Progressive leadership experience in automotive manufacturing, with a strong focus on high-volume metal forming or stamping plants.
Deep technical background in high-tonnage mechanical/servo presses, advanced progressive/transfer dies, and automated assembly line configurations.
Direct exposure to hot stamping (press hardening) processes, including roller hearth furnaces, rapid water-cooling quenching dies, and laser cutting equipment (Preferred).
Strong experience managing maintenance departments utilizing computerized maintenance management systems (CMMS) to execute predictive, preventative, and corrective maintenance.
Familiarity with robotic automation (e.g., Fanuc robots, automated transfer line components, and arc/spot welding technologies).
Strong understanding of Tier 1 automotive customer requirements and OEM-specific engineering and delivery standards.
Demonstrated success in driving Lean manufacturing, OEE optimization, and root-cause breakdown analysis.
Working knowledge of IATF 16949, APQP, PPAP, and automotive quality validation tracking.
Strong leadership, communication, and problem-solving skills with the ability to influence and align production, maintenance, and engineering teams.
Experience within Gestamp or a similar global automotive structural components supplier environment (Preferred).