Manufacturing Engineering Director

Manufacturing Engineering Director – Aerospace

Location: Montgomery, Alabama Area

Relocation: Comprehensive relocation support available

Employment: Permanent

We are supporting a major global aerospace manufacturer in the appointment of a Manufacturing Engineering Director to lead the Manufacturing Engineering function at a large, established US facility specialising in advanced composite structures.

This is a senior site leadership position with responsibility for an organisation of approximately 55 Manufacturing Engineering professionals, supporting both new product introduction and established aerospace programmes.

The role

You will have site-wide responsibility for Manufacturing Engineering capability, performance and development, including:

• Leading and developing a multidisciplinary ME organisation, including approximately nine direct reports.


• Owning Manufacturing Engineering strategy across NPI, industrialisation and serial production.


• Supporting advanced composite manufacturing, including lay-up, cure, bonding, machining, tooling, inspection/NDI and assembly.


• Driving improvements across quality, delivery, cost, throughput and process capability.


• Leading technical problem-solving, manufacturing recovery and continuous improvement.


• Developing the existing team, engineering capability and succession pipeline.


• Working closely with Operations, Quality, Supply Chain and Programme Management.


• Acting as a senior technical interface with major aerospace and defence customers.

What we're looking for

We are particularly interested in candidates with:

• Significant Manufacturing Engineering leadership experience within aerospace or defence.


• Strong exposure to composite manufacturing.


• Broad understanding of the complete manufacturing lifecycle, from NPI/process development through production ramp-up and sustainment.


• Experience leading and developing sizeable engineering organisations.


• Strong customer-facing technical credibility.


• Knowledge of Lean, APQP, PFMEA and structured problem-solving methodologies.


• An Engineering degree or equivalent technical background.

This is an opportunity to take functional ownership of Manufacturing Engineering at a significant US aerospace facility, with considerable influence across manufacturing strategy, organisational development, customer relationships and future site capability.

A competitive Director-level package is available alongside comprehensive relocation support.

Please get in touch for a confidential discussion and further information.