European Chiller Engineering Design Manager
Johnson Controls · Dublin
The Chiller Engineering Design Manager is responsible for leading a multidisciplinary design organization supporting new product development, product enhancements, and sustaining engineering design activities across the portfolio of Chiller Products serving the EMEA market. The role ensures that mechanical and electrical design resources, systems, processes, and standards are effectively deployed to deliver high-quality engineering outputs aligned with business objectives, customer requirements, regulatory expectations, and manufacturing needs.
Working closely with local Product Engineering and Global Component Engineering teams, the Design Manager is responsible for translating product requirements into robust, manufacturable, and scalable design solutions while ensuring effective collaboration across engineering disciplines.
In addition to driving design execution and operational excellence, the Design Manager plays a key role in supporting the company's European growth strategy by developing local engineering capabilities, advancing standardization and continuous improvement, and strengthening the contribution of the European organization within a global engineering structure.
What You Will Do
- Lead and develop a multidisciplinary Mechanical and Electrical Design organization responsible for delivering new product development, product enhancement, and sustaining engineering design activities for the EMEA Chiller portfolio.
- Deliver high-quality engineering design outputs that meet business objectives, product roadmaps, customer expectations, regulatory requirements, and manufacturing needs.
- Drive design excellence through effective resource planning, prioritization, talent development, and continuous improvement initiatives.
- Ensure adherence to engineering design standards, methodologies, and governance processes, driving quality, compliance, efficiency, and consistency across all engineering deliverables.
- Build strong partnerships with manufacturing teams in Nantes, France and Izmir, Turkey to support Design for Manufacturing, product industrialization, engineering change implementation, and overall operational excellence.
- Foster a culture of collaboration, accountability, innovation, and continuous improvement across the Design organization.
- Support the company's European growth strategy by developing local engineering capabilities, strengthening organizational capacity, and building a scalable design function.
- Promote alignment between local business priorities and global engineering strategies, standards, and best practices.
- Develop and maintain strong relationships with Engineering, Manufacturing, Product Management, Quality, Supply Chain, and other key stakeholders to ensure successful execution of business and product objectives.
- Strengthen the contribution, visibility, and influence of the European Design organization within the company's global engineering network.
How You Will Do It
People Leadership
- Lead, coach, mentor, and develop a team of Mechanical and Electrical Designers.
- Build an engaged and high-performing team that maximizes both individual and collective capabilities.
- Conduct performance reviews, goal setting, succession planning, and talent development activities.
- Support talent acquisition and workforce planning to ensure the organization can meet current and future business needs.
- Promote a culture of safety, inclusion, collaboration, and continuous improvement.
Design & Engineering Operations
- Direct the allocation and utilization of design resources to ensure projects meet agreed objectives, schedules, budgets, and quality standards.
- Lead design-related processes and governance to ensure standardization and efficient dissemination of engineering information.
- Ensure engineering drawings, models, bills of materials, and related deliverables accurately communicate engineering requirements and comply with applicable standards.
- Review and interpret compliance requirements, industry standards, and internal engineering procedures.
- Maintain effective communication with engineering teams, project teams, manufacturing organizations, and internal customers.
- Provide regular updates to engineering leadership regarding resource capacity, priorities, risks, and opportunities.
Cross-Functional Engineering Leadership
- Partner closely with Product Engineering teams responsible for product performance, component selection, ratings, certifications, and compliance.
- Ensure effective collaboration between Design and Product Engineering functions throughout the product lifecycle.
- Support the translation of product requirements into practical, efficient, and manufacturable design solutions.
- Drive alignment across Design, Engineering, Quality, Manufacturing, and Product Management organizations.
- Participate in strategic planning and product development initiatives supporting business growth.
Design Systems, Engineering Data & Digital Engineering
- Oversee the effective use of design tools, PLM systems, and engineering processes.
- Provide local leadership and prioritization for PLM and Architecture resources, ensuring alignment between engineering needs, business priorities, and global functional strategies.
- Ensure teams are equipped with current tools, technologies, and capabilities necessary to support business objectives.
- Support best practices in product data management, configuration management, engineering change management, and product lifecycle processes.
Manufacturing Collaboration
- Serve as a key engineering interface with manufacturing facilities in Nantes, France and Izmir, Turkey.
- Collaborate with manufacturing teams to improve manufacturability, assembly efficiency, quality, cost, serviceability, and operational performance.
- Support production issue resolution and implementation of engineering changes.
- Ensure released engineering documentation effectively supports manufacturing operations and business needs.
Resource Management
- Contribute to annual operating and investment planning to ensure appropriate resources, tools, and capabilities are available to support business objectives.
- Monitor resource utilization, capacity, and project demands to ensure effective support of engineering priorities.
- Ensure efficient use of financial and human resources while maintaining operational excellence.
- Recommend investments in tools, processes, and capabilities that improve organizational performance.
Quality & Continuous Improvement
- Develop and maintain engineering standards, procedures, and design documentation in collaboration with Global peers
- Lead initiatives to improve quality, productivity, engineering effectiveness, and delivery performance.
- Establish measures and controls to ensure deliverables consistently achieve the highest levels of accuracy, reliability, and compliance.
- Drive continuous improvement through process optimization, lessons learned, and best-practice sharing.
Supporting Local Growth Within a Global Organization
- Act as a key leader in the continued development and expansion of the European engineering organization within a global business environment.
- Build and strengthen local engineering capabilities to support current and future growth objectives.
- Represent the needs and priorities of the European design organization while aligning with global engineering strategies and standards.
- Foster effective collaboration across international engineering teams and centers of excellence.
- Support the adoption of global processes, tools, and best practices while ensuring they meet local business and operational requirements.
- Contribute to strategic initiatives that increase the capability, visibility, and influence of the European engineering organization within the company.
Success Measures
The successful candidate will:
- Deliver engineering design projects on schedule, within budget, and to required quality standards.
- Build and develop a high-performing and scalable design organization.
- Build and sustain a highly engaged engineering organization with strong talent development, retention, and succession readiness.
- Improve engineering productivity through standardization, automation, and digital engineering initiatives.
- Strengthen collaboration between Design, Product Engineering, Manufacturing, and other key stakeholders.
- Support European business growth through effective resource planning and organizational development.
- Drive improvements in engineering data quality, PLM adoption, and engineering process effectiveness.
- Enhance manufacturability and operational excellence across European manufacturing sites.
- Increase the capability and contribution of the local engineering organization within the company's global engineering network.
What we look for
Education
- Bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Industrial Engineering, or a related engineering discipline.
- Master's degree in Engineering, Engineering Management, or Business Administration is considered an asset.
Experience
- 8+ years of progressive experience in product development, engineering design, or engineering operations within a manufacturing environment.
- 3+ years of people leadership experience managing engineering, design, or technical teams.
- Experience leading multidisciplinary teams consisting of Mechanical and Electrical Design resources.
- Demonstrated experience supporting new product development, product enhancements, and sustaining engineering activities.
- Experience working with global engineering organizations and cross-functional teams across multiple locations.
- Experience supporting manufacturing operations and Design for Manufacturing (DFM) initiatives.
- Experience with HVAC, Chiller, Refrigeration, Thermal Management, or similar industrial equipment is preferred.
Technical Competencies
- Strong understanding of engineering drawing standards, product documentation, configuration management, and engineering change processes.
- Knowledge of mechanical and electrical design principles and engineering development processes.
- Experience with CAD and PLM systems, including engineering data management and product lifecycle processes.
- Understanding of product development methodologies, stage-gate processes, and design governance.
- Familiarity with industry standards, regulatory requirements, and product certification processes.
- Knowledge of engineering process standardization, continuous improvement, and digital engineering practices.
Leadership Competencies
- Proven ability to build, lead, and develop high-performing technical teams.
- Strong coaching, mentoring, and talent development skills.
- Exceptional stakeholder management skills with the ability to effectively influence across engineering, manufacturing, product management, and global functional organizations.
- Demonstrated capability in resource planning, workload prioritization, and organizational scaling.
- Strong decision-making and problem-solving skills in a fast-paced engineering environment.
- Experience leading organizational change, process improvement, and transformation initiatives.
Preferred Qualifications
- Experience within the HVAC, Chiller, Building Technologies, Industrial Equipment, or Applied Systems industries.
- Experience leading engineering standardization, automation, or digital transformation initiatives.
- Familiarity with European regulatory and certification requirements.
- Experience supporting multi-site manufacturing environments and international engineering teams.
- Working knowledge of Lean, Six Sigma, or continuous improvement methodologies.
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