Principal Quality Engineer - Body & Chassis

As the Principal Quality Engineer - Body Structures & Chassis, 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.

The core functions of the role are:

• 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.

As part of the Technical Quality team, the Principal Quality Engineer - Body Structures & Chassis is responsible for the management of all Body Structures & Chassis related quality concerns (QCR's) across all new model and series programmes, acting as the 'voice of the customer' including but not limited to; customer usage, problem validation, mileage accumulation, test/usage planning, budget analysis, fault identification, allocation and holding the function group to account.

Responsibilities include:

• Responsible to drive the 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.
• Responsible to ensure a robust approach is taken to identify the root cause of issues, through to successful resolution, using the Practical Problem Solving (PPS) process.
• Responsible for attending Q-Technical Meetings for every programme in development, supporting Q-Programme team in QCR resolution, together with the QCR stakeholders.
• Responsible to 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 the 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.
• Responsible for 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:

• 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.
• Self-starter capable of using initiative.

Personal Attributes:

• As one of our Principal Quality Engineers, you will naturally have an understanding and appreciation for low volume vehicle production and brand requirements.
• We work in a fast-paced environment, so the ability to act under pressure with calmness, clarity of thought, and decisive authority is crucial.
• From time to time, you will need to travel to off-site development facilities, within the UK and throughout Europe, therefore a flexible approach to travel and working hours is required.
• You will have the determination to drive forward the business to 'Best in Class' performance standards in line with brand expectations and be a lateral thinker able to think outside of the box to make structured and objective decisions.
• Other traits of a successful McLaren employee will include excellent communication skills both written and verbal and excellent attention to detail