Engineering Manager

Hours: 37.5 hours | Early finish Friday

Permanent | Full-time

Hands-on engineering. Future leadership. A genuine succession opportunity.

We have has been exclusively engaged by an established engineering and manufacturing business in Poole to appoint an Engineering Manager during an exciting period of growth.

This is not a traditional Engineering Manager position.

We are looking for someone who still wants to be close to the engineering
, solving problems, contributing to design and delivering technically complex projects, while taking responsibility for the leadership and development of a small, highly experienced engineering team.

The business operates across both defence and commercial markets
, with a strong forward order book and visibility across major programmes extending well into the next decade.

This appointment forms an important part of the organisation's long-term succession strategy
.

Two highly experienced engineers, each with decades of knowledge within the business, are approaching retirement. The successful individual will have a valuable window in which to work alongside them, absorb critical product and engineering knowledge and ensure that expertise is retained within the organisation.

At the same time, you'll be encouraged to bring fresh thinking, new ideas and modern engineering approaches to help develop the function for the future.

You’ll take responsibility for:

• Leading and coordinating the day-to-day engineering function
• Remaining hands-on across mechanical design and engineering projects
• Capturing and transferring critical technical knowledge
• Providing technical guidance and mentoring to other engineers
• Bringing greater structure to project delivery, workload and team development
• Working collaboratively across Production, Quality, Sales and the wider business
• Supporting the future recruitment and development of the engineering team
• Contributing to continuous improvement and the evolution of engineering processes

We’re deliberately keeping the industry background relatively open.

You don't need to arrive knowing this organisation's products. What matters is having the engineering fundamentals and curiosity to learn them
.

You’ll ideally bring:

• Strong mechanical engineering and mechanical design experience
• Good CAD capability and experience designing complex engineered products
• The credibility and interpersonal skills to lead experienced engineers
• A hands‑on approach and willingness to remain technically involved
• The confidence to work independently and introduce new ideas
  
  The ability to absorb complex technical knowledge quickly
• An ambition to develop into broader engineering and operational leadership

Experience with in hydraulics, fluid power, pumps, motors, valves, motion control, pneumatics or similar mechanical systems would be particularly valuable, but is not essential.

Likewise, previous defence experience is advantageous rather than mandatory
. You will, however, need to be eligible to obtain the appropriate UK security clearance.

This is an opportunity to join a successful engineering business at an important point in its development.

You’ll inherit access to an extraordinary depth of technical knowledge, while being given the opportunity to shape what the engineering function becomes next.

For someone who enjoys being an engineer but is ready to lead, influence and build
, it offers a genuine longer‑term career opportunity beyond the initial Engineering Lead remit.