Industrial Engineering Director – India
GETAHEAD India | Full-time leadership opportunity
GETAHEAD is an international sourcing, supplier development and industrialization company supporting European and international customers in developing capable manufacturing partners across Asia.
We are expanding our activities in India and are looking for an experienced Industrial Engineering Director who can take ownership of supplier qualification, industrialization, ramp-up and continuous improvement projects across the country.
This is not a purchasing role. We are looking for an experienced manufacturing professional who can walk into a supplier's plant, understand its processes and organization, identify weaknesses and risks, and lead the supplier toward the required technical, quality and production level.
A key part of the role is working at the interface between the supplier and the different technical specialists required to industrialize and stabilize production. Depending on the project, these may include testing laboratories, tooling and fixture experts, manufacturing/process engineers, quality specialists, metrology experts and customer engineering teams.
The Director does not need to be the deepest technical specialist in every discipline. However, he or she must understand how these disciplines interact, know when specialist expertise is required, and be capable of coordinating the different parties toward a stable production process.
Your Responsibilities
- Lead technical assessments and audits of manufacturing suppliers across India
- Evaluate manufacturing processes, equipment, tooling, quality systems, capacity, organization and industrial readiness
- Identify technical, quality and operational gaps and translate findings into structured improvement plans
- Lead supplier industrialization and development projects from initial assessment through qualification, ramp-up and stable series production
- Act as the technical interface between suppliers, customers and external/internal specialists
- Coordinate testing laboratories, tooling and fixture experts, process engineers, quality specialists, metrology resources and other technical experts as required by the project
- Understand laboratory and validation results and translate identified failures or deviations into concrete supplier-development activities
- Coordinate corrective actions following failed tests, product validation, process capability findings or customer feedback
- Ensure that technical issues are not only corrected temporarily, but translated into robust manufacturing processes and controls
- Work with suppliers to determine root causes and implement sustainable technical improvements
- Determine when additional specialist expertise is required and coordinate the appropriate resources
- Follow technical issues from identification through corrective action, validation and successful closure
- Support tooling, equipment, process and quality improvements necessary to achieve stable production
- Coordinate specialists, suppliers and customer teams during qualification and industrialization projects
- Assess whether suppliers are capable of supporting international customers and multiple geographic markets
- Prepare professional supplier assessment, industrialization and management reports for international customers
- Present findings, risks, corrective-action status and recommendations to senior customer and supplier management
- Build and lead GETAHEAD's future industrial engineering and supplier-development organization in India
- Travel regularly to supplier locations throughout India
Your Profile
We are particularly interested in candidates who have spent a significant part of their career inside manufacturing operations, industrial engineering, supplier quality, supplier development or plant engineering.
You should bring:
- Approximately 12+ years of relevant industrial/manufacturing experience
- Several years of project and/or team leadership responsibility
- Strong practical understanding of manufacturing processes and factory operations
- Experience conducting supplier, process, manufacturing or quality audits
- Experience in supplier development, industrialization, manufacturing engineering, quality engineering or operational improvement
- Experience taking products or processes through industrialization, ramp-up and production stabilization
- Good understanding of the interaction between manufacturing processes, tooling, testing/validation, metrology and quality
- Ability to interpret technical findings and coordinate the appropriate specialists to resolve them
- Ability to manage multidisciplinary technical workstreams without needing to be the subject-matter expert in every discipline
- Ability to identify the difference between a supplier that looks good during a presentation and one that can reliably perform in series operations
- Experience developing and following up corrective-action and improvement programs
- Strong analytical and structured problem-solving skills
- Confidence communicating with plant management as well as engineers and operators on the shop floor
- Ability to prepare concise, management-level reports in English
- Professional English communication skills
- High willingness to travel throughout India
Experience working with European, German or other international industrial customers is highly valued.
What Makes This Role Different
GETAHEAD does not intend to build a traditional sourcing office in India.
Our objective is to build an industrial capability on the ground that can independently assess suppliers and then stay involved until identified technical gaps have been resolved and reliable production has been established.
That means our work does not end with a supplier audit or an assessment report. Where required, we coordinate the laboratories, tooling specialists, engineers and other technical resources necessary to help suppliers progress from initial qualification through ramp-up to stable production.
The person joining us in this position will therefore have substantial influence over how this capability is built in India.
For the right candidate, the position offers a path toward broader leadership responsibility as our India activities grow.
We are also developing a long-term equity-based bonus participation program for senior leadership, with eligibility beginning after one year with the company. Our intention is to reward executives who help build lasting enterprise value rather than optimize only for short-term targets.
Selection Process
Because our work is highly practical, we do not want to make a senior hiring decision based only on interviews.
After an initial interview process, selected finalist candidates may be invited to accompany GETAHEAD during an actual supplier assessment in India. This will be structured as a paid professional assessment/project engagement, with agreed compensation for time spent and reimbursement of approved travel expenses.
This gives both sides the opportunity to experience working together in a real manufacturing environment before making a long-term commitment.
Location: India, with nationwide travel
Travel: High
Seniority: Director / Senior Leadership
Compensation: Competitive senior-management package, commensurate with experience
If you have built your career around understanding factories, solving industrial problems and bringing together the right technical resources to turn suppliers into reliable production partners, we would like to hear from you.
Pay: From ₹340,000.00 per month
Work Location: In person
