Engineering Leader

P.J. Wallbank Springs, Inc; Port Huron (MI); On-site; USD 140,000 - 190,000; Full time

Job summary

PJ Wallbank Springs, Inc in Port Huron, Michigan is seeking an engineering leader to build and grow a broad engineering organization focused on product, process, tooling, equipment, and controls. You’ll coach engineers, shape strategy, and influence cross-functional initiatives to create lasting competitive advantage.

Expect to lead an unusually broad scope, collaborating with executives to develop capabilities that accelerate growth and customer impact.

Qualifications

• Strong mechanical engineering foundation and sound engineering judgment.
• Experience leading meaningful technical projects or teams.
• Ability to balance technical performance, manufacturability, cost, and business objectives.
• Experience improving products, manufacturing systems, or engineering processes.
• Strong communication and collaboration across engineering, manufacturing, quality, suppliers, customers, and commercial teams.
• Player-coach mindset; hands-on when needed, focused on building capability in others.

Responsibilities

• Lead product, process, tooling, equipment, and controls engineering to create lasting competitive advantage.
• Build and coach engineers to solve bigger problems and take ownership.
• Develop manufacturing capabilities and optimize engineering systems for speed and impact.
• Lead cross-functional initiatives that strengthen the production system and business performance.
• Translate technical insight into long-term competitive advantage and growth for PJ Wallbank Springs.

Skills

Mechanical engineering

Leadership experience

Cross-functional collaboration

Strategic thinking

Mentoring/coaching

Problem solving

Tools

SolidWorks

GD&T

DFMEA

DVP&R

APQP

PPAP

Job description

You're already a strong engineer. You've solved difficult technical problems, and you've earned increasing responsibility because people trust your judgment.

But you probably also recognize your rate of growth has started to slow. Not because you've reached your potential, but because the environment around you no longer stretches you the way it once did.

In many organizations, engineering leaders become specialists. They inherit one piece of the business and optimize it. But they rarely get the opportunity to understand the entire manufacturing system, build an engineering organization, develop people, shape strategy, influence commercial decisions, and create lasting impact for our customers, our business, and the people who built it with you every day.

That's the opportunity here.

At PJ Wallbank Springs, you'll lead product, process, tooling, equipment, and controls engineering. This means you'll solve messy, complex problems every day with people inside and outside of our business. You'll help establish solid processes and new manufacturing capabilities. You'll coach early-career engineers to help accelerate their growth as next level leaders. And you'll influence strategy while helping determine where the business grows next.

It's an unusually broad role. In a larger company, those responsibilities would likely be shared across multiple departments. But here, you’ll have a chance to connect them and see how the entire business system works, which means we need an unusually capable and driven person.

It also means you'll develop unusually quickly. Our expectation isn't simply that you'll become a better engineering leader.

It's that over the next several years you'll become the kind of engineering and business leader capable of driving organizations forward, creating competitive advantage, and leading meaningful change wherever your career ultimately takes you.

That's why this role exists.

What Makes Us Different?

There are plenty of companies that make good products. There are far fewer that intentionally build great organizations.

We believe those two things are connected.

The best products are built by exceptional people. Exceptional people are developed through meaningful work, high standards, strong coaching, and the opportunity to solve difficult problems alongside other capable people.

That's what we're trying to build.

Not just a better engineering department, but a better organization. One where people can flourish and leave more capable than when they arrived. That philosophy shapes how we lead, how we hire, how we coach, and how we make decisions every day.

We believe:

• Manufacturing should be a force for good. Businesses have a responsibility to create environments where people learn, grow, contribute, and build meaningful careers while delivering exceptional results.
• Great businesses are built by developing great people. Hiring exceptional talent matters. Developing that talent matters even more. Our goal isn't simply to build great engineers. It's to help people become exceptional leaders, teammates, and problem solvers.
• Engineering should create competitive advantage. Engineering isn't a support function. It's how better products, better manufacturing systems, better economics, and better businesses are built.
• Leadership is stewardship. Leaders exist to create clarity, remove barriers, coach others, and build systems that continue improving long after they're gone.
• Growth comes from ownership. People develop fastest when they're trusted with meaningful responsibility, challenged to solve difficult problems, held to a high standard, and supported along the way.
• Results matter. How we achieve them matters just as much. We care deeply about performance because performance creates opportunity. But we refuse to separate performance from integrity, humility, continuous learning, and genuine care for the people around us.
• The best leaders are learners. We expect everyone, including our leaders, to remain learners and be curious. But curiosity alone isn't enough. We expect people to apply what they learn, reflect on the results, and always strive for better.

If you’re looking for comfort in your next role, there are easier jobs to consider. We have high expectations because the opportunity is significant.

But if you're looking to become the best engineering leader you're capable of becoming while helping build an organization that creates meaningful impact through manufacturing, you'll feel at home here.

The Role

Your role isn't simply to manage engineering. You’ll build an engineering organization that creates lasting competitive advantage for PJ Wallbank Springs while developing exceptional people along the way.

Over time, you'll grow toward leading the full engineering function, including product, process, tooling, equipment, and controls engineering. The exact path will depend on your strengths, your development, and the evolving needs of the business.

We don't expect you to own every aspect of engineering on day one, but we do expect you to continuously expand your capability. You'll work closely with our VP of Engineering to intentionally broaden your experience, exposing you to technical, operational, commercial, and leadership challenges that most engineering leaders never have the opportunity to tackle.

As your capability grows, so will your responsibility.

Your work will likely include the following:

• Build People
  • Develop engineers who solve bigger problems, think more critically, and take greater ownership over time.
  • Create an environment where high standards, coaching, accountability, and continuous learning become part of how engineering operates every day.
  • Help shape the next generation of engineering and manufacturing leaders.
• Build Better Engineering Systems
  • Improve how engineering prioritizes work, makes decisions, executes projects, launches products, and solves problems.
  • Create systems that allow engineering to execute with greater speed, consistency, and impact while reducing dependence on individual heroics.
• Build Competitive Advantage
  • Lead the development of manufacturing capabilities that make PJWS fundamentally better than the alternatives.
  • This could include improving existing production systems, developing entirely new manufacturing technologies, expanding into new products or markets, or creating technical capabilities that competitors struggle to replicate.
• Build the Future Business
  • Engineering doesn't exist to support the business. Engineering helps create the business we'll become.
  • You’ll help identify where we should grow, develop the capabilities required to get there, and translate technical insight into long-term competitive advantage.
• Lead Beyond Engineering
  • Some of your most meaningful work won't happen inside the engineering department.
  • As your capability grows, you'll increasingly lead cross-functional initiatives that strengthen our production system, improve business performance, and help shape the future of PJ Wallbank Springs.

What Success Looks Like

Your exact priorities will evolve as you develop and as the needs of the business change.You may begin by driving production system optimization or you could initially spend more time leading product innovation or new business development.

Regardless of where you start, our expectation is that you’ll build on your strengths while developing new capabilities to steadily grow toward leading the full engineering function.

By the end of your first year, you’ll likely have:

• Developed the technical understanding and leadership capability required to effectively lead product, process, tooling, equipment, and controls engineering, while building the foundation to eventually lead the broader engineering organization.
• Earned the trust of engineers, operators, and business leaders through sound judgment and consistent execution.
• Created a higher-performing engineering team that executes with greater speed, ownership, and impact across product development, manufacturing, continuous improvement, launches, and problem solving.
• Coached and developed early-career engineers into increasingly capable technical and business leaders.
• Led one or more meaningful manufacturing improvements that strengthen quality, capacity, cost, or technical differentiation. This could include initiatives such as improving coiler performance, stress relief consistency, automated loading, machine vision, or other manufacturing technologies that strengthen our competitive position.
• Successfully led one or more cross-functional business initiatives that produce measurable business results. Engineering is expected to be a driving force behind the evolution of our production system, our competitive advantage, and ultimately our business.
• Expanded your own capability through increasing responsibility and exposure to new technical and business challenges. This may include new spring geometries, materials, manufacturing processes, assemblies, or entirely new production capabilities that create meaningful opportunities for organic growth.

What We’re Looking for

We're looking for someone with the capability and ambition to become an exceptional engineering leader. Someone who enjoys solving difficult problems, building better systems, developing people, and expanding their own capability.

You'll likely bring:

• A strong mechanical engineering foundation and sound engineering judgment.
• Experience leading meaningful technical projects or teams.
• The ability to balance technical performance, manufacturability, cost, and business objectives.
• Experience improving products, manufacturing systems, or engineering processes.
• Comfort making decisions with incomplete information and adjusting quickly as new information becomes available.
• Strong communication and collaboration across engineering, manufacturing, quality, suppliers, customers, and commercial teams.
• A player-coach mindset. Willing to be hands‑on when needed, but ultimately focused on building capability in others.

You’ll probably thrive here if you naturally take ownership, think in systems, ask thoughtful questions, move with urgency, and genuinely enjoy helping other people grow.

Experience with automotive manufacturing, APQP, PPAP, SolidWorks, GD&T, DFMEA, DVP&R, or similar engineering disciplines is valuable, but we're far more interested in your capability to learn, your judgment, and your potential to grow into a broader engineering and business leadership role.

Competitive Compensation and Benefits

The compensation package will be attractive to the candidate possessing the experience, qualifications, and ability to deliver exceptional value to the company. We offer competitive pay, incentive, and benefits, including healthcare and a 401(k) plan with a company match, providing a compensation package comparable to companies much larger than we are.

Location

The position is based in scenic Port Huron, Michigan, the Maritime Capital of the Great Lakes, and is located on the shores of Lake Huron, with activities such as boating and time on the beach. This position will need to be on-site to integrate product design with our manufacturing processes, but it comes with workplace flexibility to be hybrid at times to meet both business and family/personal needs.

Community Involvement

We’re building more than products. We’re building people. This starts by investing in early-career engineers who are the future of our business. Whether that’s through the robotics practice field at our facility or the STEAM program at the local high schools that we helped fund. We’re giving local talent a compelling reason to stay or return to their hometown, knowing they can have a legitimate career with big impact.

It is the policy of PJ Wallbank Springs, Inc. to provide equal employment opportunities to all applicants and employees without regard to any legally protected status, such as race, color, ethnic status, religion, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, national origin, age, disability, or veteran status.