Manufacturing Technician in Whittlesey

About McCain.

At McCain, we’re feeding the world: from French fries to Smiles, we contribute to the important role food plays in people's lives. That’s why we’re dedicated to ensuring our core values—Family, Authentic, Trusted, and Quality—shine through every day. As a privately owned family company with over 60 years of experience, a presence in more than 160 countries, and a global team of 22,000 people, our values and culture are at the heart of everything we do. We believe that we can work together, along with our business and community partners, to bring sustainable growth and positive change today, tomorrow, and for generations to come.

Why join the McCain family.

• Your Life – we’re here to help you fulfil your potential, flourish, and thrive in work and life.
• Your Success – work alongside passionate individuals who are committed to supporting your career ambitions, drive, and success.
• Your Impact – we want you to make a meaningful, lasting impact for you, for your colleagues, and for the business.

About the role.

In every role, McCainers are ambitious, curious, and interested in helping each other create good work experiences. We think about the customer and make doing business with McCain easy.

With automation on the rise it’s important we remain ahead in our manufacturing operations. Our Manufacturing Technicians are at the sharp end of this, overseeing the plant assets. It’s their job to make quick-thinking choices to ensure our plant is always running with limited (or no) breakdowns.

This role is a hybrid role between Engineering and Operations. You work with both teams to ensure efficient running of the assets, ensuring optimum plant efficiency to deliver the quality and quantity to make us one of the UK’s favourite food products.

We are go-getters with big plans. And whilst we expect machines will break down once in a while, we believe prevention is better than the cure. We want you at the forefront of our plants, knowing how our machines are running and help us come up with new and improved ways of doing it faster and better, which is why continuous improvement and reliability will pay a huge part in your role.

If you’re looking to catapult your career, then this is a great opportunity which many of our senior leaders (including our former Vice President of Manufacturing) have progressed into from a similar role.

Leadership Principles.

Our principles, each with related practices, guide our actions across the organisation. Together, they address how McCain interacts with our customers and employees, and how we work as individuals and collectively to find success. While each role adheres to the Leadership Principles, individual roles may focus more on a specific principle or principles.

• We are customer obsessed. Customers are our starting point. By understanding their needs and leveraging data and consumer insights, we drive mutual success.
• We think big and plan ahead. Through ambition, curiosity, and smart risks, we can accomplish goals, refine processes, and innovate to scale success.
• We bring out the best in our people. We create safe spaces for our people so that trust and empowerment come naturally. Inclusion is about listening first, showing humility, and working together.
• We act like owners. Together, we clear obstacles and do the work that makes us all successful and proud to be part of McCain.

Accountabilities.

If you’re applying to our Manufacturing Technicians role then you’ll already be a qualified Engineer doing a similar job, so we don’t want to point out the obvious. But as well as being a qualified Engineer you will also need to be someone who collaborates and inspires our teams to always strive for a smooth operation - and your ability to bring people along with you is exactly what we’re looking for.

You’ll already know the importance of health and safety and hygiene. And you’ll know it’s vital that you record machine efficiencies relating to Quality, Delivery and Cost, and it will be second nature that you’re a problem solver.

We’re looking for Multi-Skilled Engineers with strong electrical and mechanical skills.

And as well as a love of chips, our ideal candidate will also have….

• The following relevant engineering qualifications (or equivalent):

• NVQ 3 / BTEC 3 in related Engineering discipline – mandatory of one or the other
• Time served apprenticeship - desirable
• HNC or equivalent – desirable
• Knowledge of SCADA or similar systems and some PLC knowledge
• Experience in fault finding
• Ability to steer continuous improvement activity in a similar role
• The ability to work under pressure and at speed
• Strong organisation and prioritisation skills
• IOSH/NEBOSH certificate – desirable

Shift Pattern.

Our shift pattern includes a mixture of days and nights, with every other weekend off.

Location.

You'll be based at our Whittlesey plant in Peterborough. If you’ve spotted our three wind turbines, then you’ll know where we are! With about 400 employees on site, we’re one of our largest plants across the GB business. Our Whittlesey plant is where we make our famous French Fries as well as our chilled products, such as our Shake Shake Fries.

The benefits of working for McCain.

Although we do encourage you to taste the goods you’ll be pleased to know we don’t pay you in ‘chips’. For working hard, you’ll also get a great salary and some pretty good benefits including:

• An excellent pension where we will pay double what you do, up to a maximum of 12% of your pay
• Flexible holidays – where you can buy & sell up to 5 days holiday per year
• Optional health cash plan
• Cycle to work scheme
• ‘Chips In’ Volunteering Day Off - to make a positive impact to the competitiveness, resilience, and long-term development of McCain communities across the globe

And of course, being part of a Global business there are great opportunities to shine/thrive should you wish to relocate in the future. We have an ambitious 5-year growth plan that presents development & progression opportunities for those who seek it out.

The McCain experience.

We are McCain: this statement is about our power collectively and our importance individually—your impact is a significant part of the business. Our winning culture focuses on authenticity and trust so we can always bring out the best in our people. Here, you have the opportunity to learn, grow, and thrive while being yourself.

Come and join The Makers to see why we are better together.

McCain Foods is an equal opportunity employer. As a global family-owned company, we strive to be the employer of choice in the diverse communities around the world in which we live and work. We recognize that inclusion drives our creativity, resilience, and success and makes our business stronger. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, religion, color, national origin, sex, age, veteran status, disability, or any other protected characteristic under applicable law.

McCain is an accessible employer. If you require an accommodation throughout the recruitment process (including alternate formats of materials or accessible meeting rooms), please let us know and we will work with you to find appropriate solutions.

Your privacy is important to us. By submitting personal data or information to us, you agree this will be handled in accordance with McCain’s Global Privacy Policy and Global Employee Privacy Policy, as applicable. McCain leverages AI in the hiring process, though all final decisions are made by humans.