Overview In this role, you will lead the program-level quality efforts for defense production, overseeing the quality team and aligning with site quality and external stakeholders. You drive process control, compliance, and continuous improvement to support production readiness and mission assurance. You will shape a quality-centric culture that enables rapid manufacturing scaling and strong customer partnerships. This position offers strategic impact across engineering, manufacturing, and supply chain in a high-stakes defense environment.
Responsibilities- Lead the program quality team and ensure compliance with AS9100, ISO, and manufacturing quality standards
- Mentor quality engineers and inspectors to support operations and continuous improvement
- Coordinate with site quality and external stakeholders (customers, government, DCMA)
- Oversee inspection/test documentation and ensure alignment with requirements and baselines
- Manage production readiness reviews, configuration audits, and quality-related contractual deliverables
- Monitor supplier quality performance and ensure correct actions via audits and KPIs
- Establish and analyze quality metrics (yield, rework, NCR/escape rates) and drive improvement
- Develop and oversee inspection strategies and issue management, including MRB/FRB and root-cause actions
- Report to senior leadership on quality results, audit outcomes, and improvement progress
- Partner with engineering, manufacturing, and supply chain to drive first-pass yield and reliability
Key requirements- Bachelor's degree in Engineering, Quality Management, or related discipline with 10-13 years of experience
- Proven leadership of quality or mission assurance teams in defense/aerospace production
- Experience with AS9100/ISO9001 systems, configuration management, and corrective action systems
- Strong background in production quality management for defense hardware or weapon systems
- Ability to lead customer interactions with Army quality offices and DCMA
- U.S. Citizenship and eligibility for Secret clearance
- Excellent leadership, communication, and interpersonal skills
- Experience with all aspects of defense/space-focused quality, root cause analysis, and continuous improvement
- Experience with implementing AS9100
- Proficiency in Microsoft Office
- Clearance eligibility and ability to access government installations
- Must be a US Citizen
- leadership
- communication
- interpersonal skills
- AS9100/ISO9001 proficiency
- configuration management
- corrective action systems
