Compliance Engineer

Rochdale area | Hybrid WFH – 2 days from home a week

How do you know the products you use are safe? In most cases, the answer is product compliance. In hazardous industries such as oil and gas, chemical and pharmaceutical, it is compliance engineers who make sure electronic equipment can operate in explosive atmospheres without becoming the ignition source. This role puts you at the centre of that work.

KO2's client is a long-established, global manufacturer of electronic products used in hazardous area and process industry applications worldwide. Their UK R&D centre designs intrinsically safe equipment, devices that limit electrical energy entering Zone 0, 1 and 2 environments so that a fault can never release enough energy to cause an explosion.

This is a succession role. The company's current compliance engineer, a highly respected specialist, retires at the end of next year, and the business wants their successor in place well ahead of that. Depending on your start date, you could have a year or more working directly alongside them, learning the products, the standards landscape and the relationships with certifying bodies before taking full ownership of the role.

That makes this a genuine opportunity for someone to step up. You do not need to be the finished article. The client will consider engineers earlier in their compliance career, or engineers from design, test or EMC backgrounds who have worked with standards and want to specialise, provided you have a real aptitude for reading and interpreting them. You will not be isolated either.

You will sit within the R&D team, work closely with a counterpart compliance engineer in Europe, and be part of an international network of standards experts across the wider group.

• Implementing and organising Ex approvals such as ATEX and IECEx, alongside electrical safety standards
• Determining which standards and legal requirements apply to new and existing products
• Reviewing electrical schematics and R&D designs against the relevant standards, and guiding design engineers on compliance from the start of a project
• Producing critical safety documentation to certification standard
• Reviewing existing products against current international approvals and initiating updates where needed
• Selecting, managing and negotiating with external certifying bodies and inspection organisations, both in the UK and internationally

• A degree in engineering, physics or another analytical subject
• A sound grasp of electronics fundamentals, for example how transistors and Zener diodes behave in a circuit
• Genuine interest in reading, interpreting and debating standards, this is the heart of the role
• Strong attention to detail and a structured, well-documented way of working
• The confidence to negotiate and hold your ground with certification bodies and senior engineers

Experience with ATEX, IECEx, LVD, EMC or UKCA is valuable but not essential. Attitude and aptitude matter more than a perfect CV match.

Compliance sign-off carries real seniority here. Nothing ships without it, and the role is respected accordingly across R&D and the wider business. You will become the UK authority on hazardous area compliance for a profitable, stable, global manufacturer, with a long structured handover from the person who currently holds that position.

To apply or for a confidential conversation about the role, contact KO2 Embedded Recruitment Solutions.