Staff Machine Reliability Engineer

DIVERGENT; Los Angeles (CA); On-site; USD 148,000 - 204,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity plan

Discretionary bonus opportunities

Paid vacation

Parental leave

Health insurance

Professional development

Job summary

Divergent is seeking a Staff Machine Reliability Engineer in Los Angeles to lead complex reliability challenges across additive manufacturing fleets. You will drive root-cause investigations, coordinate cross-functional teams, and convert learnings into durable design improvements.

The role requires guiding actions to closure, establishing engineering standards, and communicating risks to leadership. You will influence product lifecycle decisions and help push the boundaries of what can be built.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in an engineering field as listed.
• 6+ years in machine development or reliability engineering.
• Proven experience leading complex root cause investigations and corrective actions.

Responsibilities

• Own reliability issue intake, triage, and prioritization with cross‑functional SMEs.
• Drive actions from identification to validated closure of issues.
• Coordinate RCCAs for recurring machine-level failures and ensure data‑driven decisions.
• Develop engineering solutions and verify effectiveness of corrective actions.
• Inform future product design with reliability learnings and standards.
• Provide technical leadership across multiple disciplines and stakeholders.

Skills

Reliability engineering

Root cause analysis

Cross-functional leadership

Data-driven decision making

Communication skills

Education

Bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Mechatronics, Manufacturing Engineering, Systems Engineering, or related field

Tools

RCCA

8D

FMEA

Job description

Divergent is building the new industrial age. Every day, our teams design, manufacture, and assemble advanced systems for some of the world’s most demanding industries. Our integrated engineering and manufacturing platform transforms complex designs into production-ready solutions, helping customers move faster, build smarter, and deliver critical systems when they matter most. Divergent is a qualified Tier 1 supplier to global automotive OEMs and supports leading U.S. aerospace and defense companies.

Join us and help push the boundaries of what can be built.

Purpose

As Staff Machine Reliability Engineer, you will lead the resolution of Divergent’s complex and systemic machine reliability challenges across the additive manufacturing fleet. You will drive issues from escalation through root cause, engineering solution, and validated closure, while ensuring recurring failures are translated into durable technical improvements.

This role operates across Machine Development, Product Support Engineering, Service, Production, and engineering SMEs to convert fleet experience into stronger design requirements, engineering standards, validation strategies, and future machine capabilities. The Staff, Machine Reliability Engineer combines deep technical problem solving with systems thinking, cross-functional leadership, and the ability to drive reliability improvements throughout the product lifecycle.

The Role

Own Reliability Issue Intake, Triage, & Prioritization

• Screen, triage, group, organize, and support prioritization of engineering escalations based on fleet impact, recurrence, severity, and business need.
• Determine the appropriate engineering ownership and engage the required SMEs across Hardware, Automation & Controls, Materials & Processes, MDE, Software, and Supplier Quality.
• Drive clarity in clear ownership, priority, status, and next actions for open reliability issues.
• Ensure engineering escalations move quickly from identification to actionable investigation.
• Drive and support coordination of complex and cross-functional RCCAs for recurring, systemic, and machine-level failures.
• Cultivate a problem-solving culture that looks beyond symptoms to identify and understand true root cause.
• Challenge assumptions, identify gaps in evidence, and ensure technical conclusions are supported by data.

Drive Engineering Issues Through Validated Closure

• Coordinate with SMEs to develop engineering solutions and drive actions through completion.
• Provide guidance and support evidence generation to demonstrate that a corrective action sufficiently resolves the issue.
• Ensure technical debt is closed by ensuring the identification of root cause, the development of engineering solutions, and the validation that solutions correct the issue.
• Track aging and closure of engineering actions.

Inform Future Product Design

• Support the generation of engineering standards and requirements generation throughout the product lifecycle informed by reliability learnings.

Technical Leadership & Engineering Excellence

• Serve as a technical leader for reliability problems that span multiple engineering disciplines and organizational boundaries.
• Create alignment when ownership or technical direction is unclear and drive teams toward decisions based on evidence.
• Communicate reliability risks, technical findings, tradeoffs, and recommended actions clearly to engineering and business leadership.
• Improve the mechanisms, metrics, and processes used to manage engineering reliability issues and create a sustainable reliability function.

Basic Qualifications

• Ability to lawfully access information and technology that is subject to US export controls
• Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Mechatronics, Manufacturing Engineering, Systems Engineering, or a related technical field.
• 6+ years of experience in machine development, reliability engineering, manufacturing engineering, equipment engineering, or a related discipline.
• Demonstrated experience leading complex root cause investigations and corrective actions on electromechanical or automated equipment.
• Strong understanding of structured problem-solving methodologies such as RCCA, 8D, fault-tree analysis, FMEA, DOE, or equivalent methods.
• Experience working across mechanical, electrical, controls, software, manufacturing, and/or process engineering disciplines.
• Ability to interpret machine and production data, distinguish correlation from root cause, and translate findings into engineering action.
• Demonstrated ability to independently drive technically ambiguous, cross-functional problems through resolution.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to communicate technical problems and risk to both technical and non-technical stakeholders.

Preferred Qualifications

• 8+ years of experience developing, sustaining, or improving complex industrial equipment or automated manufacturing systems.
• Experience with high-complexity capital equipment, laser powder bed fusion additive manufacturing, industrial automation, robotics, additive manufacturing, semiconductor equipment, aerospace manufacturing, or similar systems.
• Experience owning reliability across a fleet of machines rather than resolving issues on a single piece of equipment.
• Experience using fleet health, downtime, utilization, failure-rate, or maintenance data to prioritize engineering work.
• Experience defining reliability requirements, validation criteria, or qualification strategies for new machine designs and engineering changes.
• Demonstrated technical leadership at the Staff level, including influencing teams and driving decisions without direct authority.
• Experience establishing or scaling reliability engineering processes, issue-management systems, engineering standards, or technical-debt reduction mechanisms.
• Onsite

Pay Range

$148,430 - $204,090 USD

What We Offer:

• Holistic Compensation Package: Enjoy a world-class compensation package that includes a competitive salary, equity plan, and discretionary results-based incentive bonus opportunities, ensuring you're truly valued for your contributions.
• Wellness and Time Off: Embrace a healthy lifestyle with paid vacation, sick time, and company holidays, including a year-end shutdown to recharge. We support growing families with paid parental leave, recognizing the importance of bonding time.
• Comprehensive Health and Wellness: Prioritize your well-being with our comprehensive health and wellness benefits, offering both HMO and Premium PPO options. Additionally, benefit from company-sponsored life insurance and short and long-term disability coverage for peace of mind.
• Investment in Growth: We're committed to your professional development. Take advantage of reimbursement opportunities for learning and development initiatives, empowering you to continuously expand your skill set and reach peak performance.
• Collaborative and High-Performing Environment: Join our collaborative, dynamic, and high-performing team within a fast-paced, mission-driven company. Together, we're disrupting the traditional manufacturing industry, fostering innovation, and integrating people and technology to reduce our footprint.

Equal Employment Opportunity

Divergent is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age, disability or veteran status, or any other applicable state or federal protected characteristic. Divergent provides affirmative action in employment for qualified Individuals with Disabilities and Protected Veterans in compliance with Section 503 of the Rehabilitation Act and the Vietnam Era Veterans’ Readjustment Assistance Act.

E-Verify: Right to Work

Our company participates in E-Verify . E-Verify is a program that electronically confirms a candidate’s eligibility to work in the United States after completing the Employment Eligibility Verification (Form I-9). The information provided on the Form I-9 is compared to the records contained in the Social Security Administration and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) databases. This helps employers verify the identity and employment eligibility of newly hired employees.

Eligibility to Work Poster (English) | Eligibility to Work Poster (Spanish)

Los Angeles Fair Chance Initiative for Hiring Ordinance (FCIHO)

Pursuant to the Los Angeles Fair Chance Initiative for Hiring Ordinance (FCIHO), we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.

No agencies, no solicitations, and no calls please.

This position requires access to information and technology that is subject to US export controls. Are you any of the following “protected individuals” as defined in the Immigration and Naturalization Act, 8 USC 1324b(a)(3)?

• Left DoD service within two years, served as a General Officer or Flag Officer , and were personally and substantially involved with acquisition projects valued in excess of $10 million.
• Left DoD service within two years, served in an Executive Schedule or Senior Executive Service (SES) position, and were personally and substantially involved with acquisitions valued in excess of $10 million.
• Left DoD service within two years, served as a Contracting Officer, Program Manager, Deputy Program Manager, Source Selection Authority, Source Selection Evaluation Board member, or Chief of a financial or technical evaluation team for a FAR-based contract with a total value in excess of $10 million.

*Personally and substantially means direct, significant involvement in a specific matter through actions like decision‑making, giving advice, investigating, or supervising subordinates who did those things, “substantially” meaning involvement of significance, not just perfunctory or peripheral contact.

**Acquisition includes: (A) the process of acquiring property or services that are already in existence, or that must be created, developed, demonstrated, and evaluated; (B) the description of requirements to satisfy agency needs; (C) solicitation and selection of sources; (D) award of contracts; (E) contract performance; (F) contract financing; (G) management and measurement of contract performance through final delivery and payment; and (H) technical and management functions directly related to the process of fulfilling agency requirements by contract.

Voluntary Self-Identification

For government reporting purposes, we ask candidates to respond to the below self‑identification survey. Completion of the form is entirely voluntary. Whatever your decision, it will not be considered in the hiring process or thereafter. Any information that you do provide will be recorded and maintained in a confidential file.

As set forth in Divergent’s Equal Employment Opportunity policy, we do not discriminate on the basis of any protected group status under any applicable law.

If you believe you belong to any of the categories of protected veterans listed below, please indicate by making the appropriate selection. As a government contractor subject to the Vietnam Era Veterans Readjustment Assistance Act (VEVRAA), we request this information in order to measure the effectiveness of the outreach and positive recruitment efforts we undertake pursuant to VEVRAA. Classification of protected categories is as follows:

A "disabled veteran" is one of the following: a veteran of the U.S. military, ground, naval or air service who is entitled to compensation (or who but for the receipt of military retired pay would be entitled to compensation) under laws administered by the Secretary of Veterans Affairs; or a person who was discharged or released from active duty because of a service‑connected disability.

A "recently separated veteran" means any veteran during the three‑year period beginning on the date of such veteran's discharge or release from active duty in the U.S. military, ground, naval, or air service.

An "active duty wartime or campaign badge veteran" means a veteran who served on active duty in the U.S. military, ground, naval or air service during a war, or in a campaign or expedition for which a campaign badge has been authorized under the laws administered by the Department of Defense.

An "Armed forces service medal veteran" means a veteran who, while serving on active duty in the U.S. military, ground, naval or air service, participated in a United States military operation for which an Armed Forces service medal was awarded pursuant to Executive Order 12985.