Engineering Manager - Progress Park Operations

HNI Corporation; Muscatine (IA); On-site; USD 100,000 - 160,000; Full time

Job summary

HNI Corporation in Muscatine, IA hosts an Engineering Center of Excellence at Progress Park, leading cross-functional engineering teams that focus on improving business agility and profitability through standards, governance and repeatability.

The Engineering Manager will partner with operations, IT, automation and technical support to drive measurable improvements, while coaching engineers and aligning projects with plant KPIs.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in engineering or related field.
• 5+ years of engineering leadership in manufacturing.
• Proven track record in continuous improvement and operational performance.

Responsibilities

• Provide strategic technical decisions and plan engineering activities for the facility.
• Deliver broad technical leadership and explain complex concepts to non-technical staff.
• Lead the process to establish Project Management within Progress Park.
• Maintain a high level of expertise in the field.
• Coach, develop, and evaluate engineers to improve performance.
• Oversee project logistics and allocate technical resources.
• Identify opportunities to improve safety, quality, delivery and cost with metrics.
• Support plant technical escalations.
• Conduct audits and gemba walks to identify gaps and improvements.
• Ensure effective onboarding for engineering resources.

Skills

Engineering leadership

Manufacturing engineering

Continuous improvement

Operations collaboration

Team development

KPIs and metrics

IT/automation partnerships

MES/IoT exposure

Education

Bachelor's degree in Engineering or related field

Tools

MES systems

Job description

HNI Corporationis a global family of brands for the workplace and home dedicated to enhancing the spaces where we live, work, and gather. Wepride ourselves on fostering an environment where we make a positive impact on others; upholding our beliefs in integrity, inclusion and belonging.

Your Impact Starts the Day You Do!

What We Need:

We are looking for an Engineering Manager to lead the Engineering Center of Excellence within Progress Park that manages cross-functional engineering teams consisting of three core areas of focus dedicated to improving business agility and profitability. Defining and maintaining standards, governance and repeatability. The ideal candidate brings a strong manufacturing engineering background, proven people leadership, and experience partnering across operations, engineering, and technical support teams to drive measurable improvements.

What You Will Do:

• Provide strategic technical decisions and solutions by creating plans, prioritizing, delegating and managing all engineers’ activities and deliverables for the facility
• Deliver broad technical leadership to the facility by communicating technical information to non-technical members
• Lead process to establish Project Management within Progress Park facility
• Maintains high level of expertise in the field
• Manage, support, and evaluate engineers’ performance to provide coaching and development opportunities
• Oversee project logistics and allocating technical resources to fit business demands
• Identify opportunities for improvements to optimize performance in safety, quality, delivery and cost and utilize metrics to manage performance
• Support plant technical escalations
• Conduct process audits and gemba walks to identify gaps and improvement opportunities
• Commit to fulfilling successful onboarding experience for all engineering resources

What You Have:

• Bachelor’s degree in Engineering, Industrial Engineering, Manufacturing Engineering, or related field
• 5+ years of engineering leadership experience in a manufacturing environment
• Proven success leading continuous improvement and operational performance initiatives
• Experience improving labor efficiency, process flow, throughput, and plant KPIs
• Strong leadership skills with experience developing engineering or technical teams
• Experience partnering with IT, automation, or systems teams on plant process improvements preferred
• Exposure to MES, IoT, dashboards, or plant visibility systems preferred
• Strong systems mindset with the ability to connect engineering decisions to plant outcomes