Director, Engineering

Detroit-Manufacturing-Systems,-LLC; Wixom (MI); On-site; USD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Job summary

Kinetyc is an adaptive manufacturing partner transforming from a contract manufacturer. This Director of Engineering will own the entire engineering organization, its people, processes, and strategic direction, reporting to the President/GM.

You will build the function for three to five years and lead a growing team across multiple disciplines. You will own the engineering roadmap, DFM strategy, and key certifications while managing senior customer relationships and high-stakes design reviews.

Qualifications

• 12–20 years of engineering experience with 5+ years leading teams.
• Deep background in mechanical, electrical, or systems engineering.
• Experience with contract manufacturers, Tier 1/2 suppliers, or HMLV environments.
• Led engineering compliance programs (ISO, CMMC, ITAR, AS9100 or equivalent).
• Ability to make good decisions with incomplete data and own the outcome.
• Able to collaborate with commercial, operations and finance leadership.

Responsibilities

• Lead the full Kinetyc engineering team, defining structure, roles and growth paths.
• Own the engineering roadmap, processes, and certifications to pursue.
• Manage customer relationships from engagement to production as a peer.
• Lead DFM strategy, design reviews, risk identification, and onboarding for launches.
• Drive engineering culture of ownership, continuous improvement and collaboration.
• Represent Kinetyc capabilities in high‑stakes customer conversations and audits.
• Oversee compliance posture (CMMC Level 2, ISO 9001:2015, ITAR/AS9100).
• Evaluate build‑vs‑buy decisions and partner with commercial, ops, and finance.

Skills

Engineering leadership

Multidisciplinary engineering

Mechanical engineering

Electrical engineering

Systems engineering

Customer relationships

Compliance programs

Job description

Why This Role Exists

Kinetyc is at an inflection point. We’re moving from a capable contract manufacturer into a true adaptive manufacturing partner — one that serves the most technically demanding customers in drones, defense, robotics, and clean energy. To get there, we need an engineering leader who can build the function from the inside: someone who owns both the technical rigor and the team, can stand in a room with a customer’s chief engineer as a peer, and can partner directly with the GM to shape what Kinetyc’s engineering capability looks like in three to five years.

This is a Director-level role. It carries full ownership of the engineering organization — its people, its processes, its strategic direction, and its output. It is not a step toward leadership. It is leadership.

What You’ll Own

Engineering Team & Organization

• Lead, develop, and hold accountable the full Kinetyc engineering team — AMEs, ME, EE, and CAE — as both a manager and a coach
• Define team structure, roles, and growth paths that scale with Kinetyc’s customer base and market expansion
• Build a culture of technical ownership, continuous improvement, and collaborative problem-solving within the engineering function
• Recruit and develop engineering talent in alignment with Kinetyc’s HMLV model and frontier market focus

Customer & Product Engineering

• Own the technical relationship with key customers from initial engagement through production — as a senior engineering peer, not a support function
• Lead DFM strategy, design reviews, systems integration assessments, and technical risk identification across the customer portfolio
• Design and govern the customer engineering onboarding process — defining standards, timelines, and accountability for successful product launches
• Translate customer design intent into executable manufacturing plans; identify and resolve gaps between customer expectations and Kinetyc capabilities early
• Represent Kinetyc’s technical capability in high-stakes customer conversations — executive briefings, site audits, design reviews

Strategic Engineering Leadership

• Serve as a member of Kinetyc’s senior leadership team — contributing to business strategy, not just engineering execution
• Own the engineering roadmap: capabilities to build, tools to invest in, processes to formalize, and certifications to pursue
• Lead Kinetyc’s engineering compliance posture — including CMMC Level 2, DD2345, ISO 9001:2015 stewardship, and future defense or regulatory requirements
• Drive FLEXembly™ innovation initiatives from the engineering side — identifying where customer insight and manufacturing capability can create proprietary solutions
• Evaluate build vs. buy decisions for engineering tools, capacity, and partnerships

What You’ve Done

• 12–20 years of engineering experience, with at least 5 years leading engineering teams in a manufacturing or product development environment
• Managed and developed engineers across multiple disciplines — you’ve built teams, not just led projects
• Deep background in mechanical, electrical, or systems engineering; hands‑on experience with complex electromechanical or assembled products
• Owned customer-facing technical relationships at a senior level — you’ve been in the room when the stakes were high and the specs weren’t finished
• Worked inside or alongside contract manufacturers, Tier 1/2 suppliers, or HMLV production environments
• Led or contributed meaningfully to engineering compliance programs — ISO, CMMC, ITAR, AS9100, or equivalent
• Operated effectively in environments without perfect information — you’ve made good calls with incomplete data and owned the outcome
• Demonstrated ability to operate as a peer with commercial, operations, and finance leadership — not just within the engineering function

What Makes You Different

• You build engineers, not just products — you take the development of your team as seriously as the quality of the work
• You think at the system level and act at the detail level — comfortable in a strategic conversation in the morning and a root cause analysis in the afternoon
• You ask the uncomfortable question early instead of absorbing the problem late
• You treat customer relationships as long-term partnerships, not transactions — and you bring your team along in that mindset
• You know how to protect engineering capacity for strategic work while keeping the operation running

Why Kinetyc

We’re not a traditional contract manufacturer. We’re an adaptive manufacturing partner to companies building the hard things — drones, defense systems, robotics, clean energy, and advanced mobility. We operate with the discipline of Detroit manufacturing and the agility of a

startup. Our customers are trying to change their industries; we’re building the manufacturing capability that makes that possible.

This Director of Engineering role sits at the center of that mission. You’ll report directly to the President/GM, lead a capable and growing engineering team, and help define what Kinetyc’s engineering function looks like as we scale. If you want to build something — not just manage something — this is the job.