Quality Assurance Manager in Rugby

Our Quality Engineering team serves as the critical link between design, manufacturing, and customer delivery. We go beyond traditional inspection, embedding quality into every stage of the product lifecycle to build enduring confidence with customers and stakeholders. Through a proactive, prevention-focused mindset and data-driven decision-making, we strengthen capability, reduce risk, and deliver measurable operational and business improvements while maintaining the highest standards of safety, reliability, and performance.

As the Quality Assurance Manager at our Rugby site, you will be a visible leader on the shop floor, taking ownership of product quality across our manufacturing operations. Working closely with production teams, you'll make critical quality decisions, resolve issues at source, and ensure the right balance between quality, delivery, and customer requirements.

Supporting low-volume, highly specialised manufacturing for the defence, aerospace, and heavy industrial sectors, you'll drive a culture of accountability, problem-solving, and continuous improvement, ensuring products are built right first time. As a key member of the site leadership team, you'll strengthen operational performance and help shape the future of our manufacturing capability.

Management & Leadership

• Maintain a daily, proactive presence on the shop floor to monitor performance and identify process risks before they affect delivery.
• Review legacy processes to drive the adoption of modern, effective methodologies.
• Provide daily leadership to the quality teams setting clear objectives and development plans.
• Maintain rigorous performance management standards to ensure alignment with manufacturing and quality goals.

Operational Governance & Performance Management

• Chair daily quality governance meetings and hold authority over GO/NO-GO decisions.
• Monitor the RMR Quality Dashboard to identify trends, manage risks, and report performance to the leadership team.
• Drive measurable improvements in customer and internal escapes, Product COPQ, inspection backlogs, audit completion, and production recovery activities.

Product Conformity & Quality Assurance

• Define risk-based inspection strategies and lead production quality readiness activities, including FAT and pre-FAT milestones.
• Establish expectations for reliability engineering and analytical methodologies, including FMEA, DFMEA, FTA, and structured problem-solving approaches such as 8D and DMAIC.

Process Improvement

• Act as the primary technical point of contact for customer quality requirements, ensuring expectations are understood and achieved.
• Lead Lean Quality initiatives and chair weekly Root Cause Analysis (RCA) reviews to drive sustainable corrective and preventive actions.

Digital Data Transformation

• Experience leveraging digital quality systems, performance analytics, dashboards, and ERP platforms such as SAP to drive informed decision-making and operational excellence.

Data-Driven Quality

• Champion Visual Management, Kaizen activities, and lessons learned programmes to strengthen manufacturing robustness, quality performance, and operational efficiency.

Essential Candidate Requirements

• Professional Expertise: A degree in Engineering, Manufacturing, or a Quality-related discipline (or equivalent professional experience) with a proven track record in manufacturing quality leadership.
• Team Leadership: The ability to coach and develop talent across diverse engineering teams.
• Quality Transformation: Demonstrated success in leading quality transformation, moving beyond traditional inspection to embed quality at the source through modern, digital quality systems.
• Technical Skills: Advanced expertise in Root Cause Analysis (RCA), CAPA, ISO 9001, Lean manufacturing principles, and KPI management.
• Operational Influence: Experience influencing manufacturing strategy and driving operational excellence within high-compliance environments.

Desirable

• Advanced Quality Methodologies: Working knowledge of APQP, PPAP, PFMEA, Control Plans, and statistical quality tools, including SPC and MSA.
• Continuous Improvement Expertise: Six Sigma Green Belt or Black Belt certification, or equivalent experience in driving operational and quality improvement initiatives.
• Industry Experience: Experience within rotating electrical machines, heavy engineering, power generation, aerospace, defence, or other complex manufacturing environments.

What We Offer

• Competitive compensation
• A performance-related bonus
• Flexible pension with a 10% employers' contribution
• Employer-funded private health insurance
• Income protection
• Life assurance
• 26 days of holiday, plus bank holidays
• Our 'Flex Choice' programme, you can take advantage of corporate benefits such as buying and selling holiday, a cycle-to-work scheme, financial planning, critical illness insurance, personal accident cover, dental cover, option to add family to a private health scheme, and travel insurance.

Why Join Us?

Join us at a pivotal time as we modernise our manufacturing capability and shape the future of quality across our Rugby operation. This is an opportunity to influence strategy, lead meaningful change, strengthen digital capability, and make a lasting impact on the performance, reliability, and integrity of products used in critical applications worldwide.

Additional Information

• Relocation Assistance Provided: No

Addressing the climate crisis is an urgent global priority and we take our responsibility seriously. That is our singular mission at GE Vernova: continuing to electrify the world while simultaneously working to help decarbonize it. If we want our energy future to be different ... we must be different. Our mission is embedded in our name. We retain our treasured legacy, "GE," in our name as an enduring and hard-earned badge of quality and ingenuity. "Ver" / "verde" signal Earth's verdant and lush ecosystems. "Nova," from the Latin "novus," nods to a new, innovative era of lower carbon energy that GE Vernova will help deliver. Together, we have The Energy to Change the World.