Hardware Engineering Manager in Crawley

Location: Templecombe, United Kingdom

Thales is a global technology leader with more than 83,000 employees on five continents. With over 7,500 people in the UK, operating across defence, space, aerospace, and digital security, we help build a future we can all trust. Thales supports the security and stability of our nation by providing extraordinary technology to our customers, as well as delivering social value to the UK with our products and services.

Thales Underwater Systems is a global leader in complex maritime engineering, delivering the ship‑wide systems that power world‑class platforms including the Queen Elizabeth Class aircraft carriers. Our portfolio spans Communications, Command Information Systems, Systems Integration, Autonomous Systems, Sonar, and Advanced Data Connectivity.

Due to expansion and resilience planning, we are looking for a Hardware Engineering Manager to join our operations at either Templecombe or Crawley. You will ideally be an experienced Hardware (Mech/Elec/System) Engineer with experience that has expanded to team leadership, work package management or leading project deliverables within a safety critical/regulated engineering environment.

Role overview

The Hardware Engineering Manager (HwEM) is responsible for the completion of a set of engineering tasks within the committed cost, schedule, performance and quality. The related tasks may cover part or all the range of activities regarding customer needs, mission, function, architectural design, and life cycle of the hardware solution (requirements and speciality engineering, design, development, integration and verification).

You will ensure Hardware Engineering activity management within constraints provided by the Solution Engineering Manager, the Solution and Hardware Architects. In this capacity the Hardware Engineering Manager:

• Defines the Hardware development cycle in consistency with that of upper/same level elements (dependencies, co-engineering activities).
• Tailors the Hardware engineering environment (process, practices and tools) according to Company and Project requirements.
• Allocates responsibilities to individual contributors.
• Participates in the specification of the functions and interfaces of products to be developed.
• Participates in the definition of the architecture, and the allocation of functions, to the components for which they have primary responsibility.

Experience required

• Experience within Systems, Hardware or Electronics Engineering within a highly regulated environment, working with multi-discipline teams of engineers.
• Experience of technical leadership of either small teams or programmes of work.
• Project or Programme delivery experience/knowledge would be desirable.
• Engineering Lifecycle experience.
• Desirable experience with Project tracking, ideally Jira but other agile management tools would be desirable although not essential.

Security Clearance statement

Due to the nature of the work that we do at Thales, many of our roles are subject to security restrictions. This role requires you to be a sole British National from birth and achieve Security Clearance (SC) without any caveats. It would be advantageous if currently held, however, if not currently held, it is a requirement that the successful applicant undergo, achieve, and maintain SC Clearance prior to commencing employment. To be eligible for full SC, you generally need to have resided in the UK for the last 5 years. In some circumstances, a minimum of 3 years’ residence in the UK over the last 5 years may be accepted, with additional overseas checks.

What we can offer

We are committed to giving you opportunities to be your best. We believe in embracing the passion and potential of our people, and to achieve this we offer market leading training, development and experiences, along with the opportunity to be mentored and coached by some of the smartest minds in the industry. We hire from within as our first priority, so you’ll have a myriad of opportunities within our diverse, global organisation.

Our packages will include bonus, a strong pension contribution, private healthcare, development focused targets and relocation support can be provided if required along with a variety of learning, development and career enhancement opportunities. Further support can be provided towards academic and membership attainments.

Thales is an equal opportunities employer and diversity and inclusion are integral to the success of Thales. At Thales, we ensure equal opportunities, pay and working conditions for all. The benefits we offer include private medical insurance, buying or selling annual leave, cycle to work schemes, employee discounts, paid volunteering day, stocks and shares, annual bonus and much more depending on the role. We are committed to creating a workplace where everyone feels valued for who they are and the unique strengths they bring.

If this role isn’t quite right for you, we encourage you to join our talent community where your details will be shared with our recruitment teams for other potential opportunities.

Join Thales in the UK – Innovate with us and shape the future!