Lead PLC Technician

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Full Time Hickory, NC, hickory, NC, US

The Lead PLC Controls Technician serves as the technical lead for the installation, maintenance, troubleshooting, commissioning, and repair of industrial control systems, automation equipment, and related electrical components. In addition to performing hands-on technical work, this position coordinates daily field activities, provides technical direction to assigned technicians and electricians, monitors work quality and progress, and serves as a primary point of contact for customers, supervisors, project managers, and engineering teams.

The ideal candidate has advanced experience with programmable logic controllers (PLCs), control panels, motor controls, instrumentation, and industrial electrical systems. This individual must be able to independently diagnose complex control-system issues, make authorized programming and configuration adjustments, guide team members through technical challenges, and help ensure projects and service activities are completed safely, accurately, and on schedule.

This is a working lead position and requires active participation in fieldwork. The role may provide day-to-day direction and technical oversight to assigned employees but does not necessarily have formal hiring, disciplinary, or performance-management authority unless specifically designated by management.

Serve as the onsite technical lead for assigned control-system installations, service calls, maintenance activities, startups, and commissioning projects.

Coordinate daily work assignments, priorities, materials, tools, and technical activities for assigned technicians, electricians, subcontractors, and other project personnel.

Provide hands-on technical guidance, coaching, and troubleshooting support to less-experienced technicians and team members.

Monitor work quality, productivity, safety, and project progress, and promptly communicate concerns, delays, scope changes, or resource needs to the appropriate supervisor or project manager.

Verify that assigned work is completed in accordance with project specifications, electrical drawings, customer requirements, company standards, and applicable codes.

Install, maintain, troubleshoot, and repair PLC-based control systems and industrial automation equipment.

Diagnose complex electrical, control, communication, and programming issues affecting equipment performance.

Connect to PLCs to monitor system operation, review logic, identify faults, and make authorized programming changes.

Troubleshoot and configure human-machine interfaces (HMIs), variable frequency drives (VFDs), motor controls, sensors, relays, instrumentation, and control devices.

Install, terminate, test, and label control wiring, communication cables, instrumentation, and electrical components.

Read and interpret electrical drawings, control schematics, ladder logic, panel layouts, process diagrams, equipment manuals, and project specifications.

Perform and lead startup, commissioning, functional testing, and validation of new or modified control systems.

Assist with and provide technical oversight for PLC, HMI, and VFD programming, configuration, backups, and documentation.

Troubleshoot industrial communication networks and connectivity between control-system components.

Lead root-cause analysis efforts for equipment failures and recommend corrective and preventive actions.

Maintain current backups of PLC programs, HMI applications, and equipment configurations in accordance with company procedures.

Coordinate work with customers, supervisors, project managers, engineering teams, electricians, vendors, subcontractors, and other trades.

Serve as a primary onsite contact for technical questions, work coordination, customer updates, and issue escalation.

Provide clear and timely status updates regarding work completed, outstanding items, technical risks, system conditions, and recommended next steps.

Assist with training, onboarding, and skills development for technicians and…