Senior Project Engineer - Capital & Automation

Bridgestone Americas, Inc.; Oxford (NC); On-site; USD 110,000 - 140,000; Full time

Job summary

The Lead Project Engineer at Bridgestone Americas, Inc. in Oxford, NC will direct multi-project capital and continuous-improvement initiatives from concept to turnover, ensuring safe, cost-effective, and maintainable solutions aligned with production and quality goals.

You will coordinate Operations, Maintenance, EHS, Quality, Procurement, and Finance, driving front-end definitions, equipment concepts, and commissioning plans while maintaining schedules, budgets, and risk controls.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Mechanical or Electrical Engineering.
• 8+ years of progressive engineering experience in manufacturing.
• Experience leading multiple concurrent projects through full lifecycle.
• Knowledge of project cost and schedule controls.
• Ability to coordinate across multiple functions.

Responsibilities

• Lead complex capital, reliability, automation, and cost-reduction projects; establish priorities, scope, schedules, budgets, risks, and resource plans.
• Develop front-end project definition, including business cases, alternatives analysis, feasibility assessments, equipment concepts, process requirements, preliminary layouts, cost estimates, and ROI support.
• Specify, design, evaluate, and integrate manufacturing equipment, utilities, material-handling systems, tooling, guarding, piping, structural modifications, and related plant infrastructure.
• Prepare and review engineering drawings, scopes of work, bid packages, technical specifications, installation plans, commissioning plans, and turnover documentation.
• Manage project controls, including schedule, cost, forecast, change control, risk register, action tracking, contractor performance, and regular stakeholder reporting.
• Coordinate equipment procurement and contractor activities; lead technical bid evaluations, support vendor selection, negotiate technical requirements, and verify deliverables against scope and standards.
• Plan and execute installations in coordination with production and maintenance, including outage planning, lockout/tagout coordination, site readiness, startup support, and safe handoff to plant ownership.
• Lead factory/site acceptance activities, commissioning, qualification, and performance verification; confirm that projects meet safety, quality, throughput, reliability, maintainability, and financial objectives.
• Identify, prioritize, and lead continuous-improvement and automation opportunities using root-cause analysis, data, Lean principles, and structured problem-solving methods.
• Partner with Operations, Maintenance, Quality, EHS, and Technical teams to eliminate chronic losses, improve OEE, reduce scrap and downtime, increase capacity, and improve ergonomics and process stability.
• Ensure projects comply with applicable safety, environmental, quality, engineering, and plant standards; incorporate machine safety, energy isolation, ergonomics, and maintainability into designs.
• Develop technical standards and best practices for project execution, equipment design, documentation, spare parts, preventive maintenance, and contractor work.
• Communicate project status, decisions, risks, and recovery plans to plant leadership and other stakeholders; escalations promptly when scope, cost, schedule, safety, or production commitments are at risk.
• Candidates should be prepared to work during weekends or holidays as needed to support plant shutdown activities or project installations

Skills

Project management

Cross-functional collaboration

Problem solving

Communication

Education

Bachelor's degree in Mechanical or Electrical Engineering

Professional Engineer (PE) or PMP preferred

Tools

CAD

Job description

The Lead Project Engineer at Bridgestone Americas, Inc. in Oxford, NC will direct multi-project capital and continuous-improvement initiatives from concept to turnover, ensuring safe, cost-effective, and maintainable solutions aligned with production and quality goals.

You will coordinate Operations, Maintenance, EHS, Quality, Procurement, and Finance, driving front-end definitions, equipment concepts, and commissioning plans while maintaining schedules, budgets, and risk controls.