Product Safety Manager

Location: Reading, 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 develop and engineer cutting edge products and technologies such as autonomous platforms (air and maritime), high performance sonar arrays, Air Traffic Management systems, electronic warfare & counter measure systems, to name a few.

Due to ongoing growth and succession planning within our central safety team, we are currently recruiting for a Product Safety Manager/Principal Safety Engineer. This is not a functional management role, but would provide technical leadership for system safety/product safety activities, with opportunities across several high value, complex engineering developments.

As part of the UK Safety Team you will have the opportunity to lead safety engineering activities on these complex and challenging projects while continuing to develop your safety engineering knowledge. This role provides a fantastic career opportunity to develop your systems safety engineering skills and experience as well as your leadership capability by providing guidance to projects and senior stakeholders and mentorship to our Product Safety Engineers / System Safety Engineers.

Typically, you will be involved in:

• Supporting bids, generating safety engineering estimates and leading the work packages.
• Developing safety plans & ensuring the implementation of the Thales UK SMS at project level.
• Applying and leveraging your knowledge of Systems Safety Engineering to complex systems and supporting/mentoring junior Product Safety / Systems Safety Engineers.
• Leading, managing and sometimes undertaking systems safety activities and assessments.
• Ensuring that Thales products are supported by robust safety cases and evidence.
• Working in multidisciplinary project/product teams to identify and manage hazards and risks.

What we are looking for in successful candidates:

• A degree, or equivalent qualification, in a relevant subject area i.e. STEM.
• Experience of Systems Safety/Product Safety Engineering activities in a complex, safety focussed and regulated organisation, such as rail, aerospace, nuclear or oil & gas.
• Experience of working to a safety management system and implementing it at project level.
• Demonstrable experience in the management of engineering work packages & budgets.
• Demonstrable experience in planning and delivering safety engineering programmes of work.
• Extensive experience of undertaking Systems Safety activities including System Fault Tree Analysis (FTA), Event Tree Analysis (ETA), Common Cause Failure Analysis, Functional Failure Analysis (FFA), Failure Modes Effects and Criticality Analysis (FMECA), Interface Hazard Analysis (IHA), System Hazard Logs, System Hazard Analysis Reports.
• Extensive knowledge of legal & regulatory frameworks for safety (UK, EU, MAA, CAA etc.).
• Experience of developing & managing safety cases and generating ALARP arguments.
• Experience in the application of standards such as Def Stans 00-56 & 00-55, EN 50126, EN 50128, EN 50129, IEC 61508 or equivalent from other industries.
• Aware of safety occurrence investigation principles and processes.

Security Clearance statement: Due to the nature of the work that we do at Thales, many of our roles are subject to security restrictions. 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’re 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 contribute plan matched up to 7%, Private healthcare, development focused targets and relocation support can be provided if required along with a variety of learning, development and career enhancement opportunities.

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!