Product Manager - CAD Engineering Lead

Product Manager - CAD Engineering Lead The

CAD Engineering

• Lead owns the digital backbone of how we design, develop, and deliver product. From the engineer’s first sketch in CAD through release into manufacturing and service, this role
• is responsible for
• the platforms, data, and processes that make product development fast, reliable, and scalable. It is a deliberate evolution beyond traditional CAD administration—less about keeping the lights on, and more about shaping how engineering works at scale.
• This is a strategic, business-aligned position
• with a n operational role . The person in this seat will be expected to think in terms of roadmaps, business cases, and measurable outcomes, while
• remaining

close enough to the technology to make confident architectural decisions. They will partner across Engineering, IT, Supply Chain, and Manufacturing to ensure our engineering systems are a competitive advantage rather than a constraint on growth.

What You'll Do

Own the Engineering Systems Landscape

• You will be accountable for the architecture, configuration, performance, and roadmap of our CAD and PDM/PLM platforms—making sure they are stable on their own and integrated cleanly into the broader ecosystem.
• Own the architecture, configuration, and performance of CAD and PDM/PLM platforms
• Ensure seamless integration across CAD, PLM, ERP, and manufacturing systems
• Define a system roadmap aligned to product development and supply chain strategy

Establish Governance and Standards

• Engineering at scale depends on consistency, and consistency depends on standards. You will define and enforce the standards that allow engineers across geographies to work as one team.
• Establish and enforce CAD modeling standards
• Define data structures, naming conventions, and BOM governance
• Own release and change management processes
• Drive consistency across global engineering teams

Protect the Digital Thread

Product data

• has to
• flow accurately from design into manufacturing
• and on
• into service—without distortion, duplication, or loss of context. You will own that
• flow
• end to end.
• Ensure product data flows accurately from design → manufacturing → service
• Own product data quality, version control, and traceability

Eliminate

duplication, rework, and downstream errors

Drive Engineering Productivity

• Engineers should spend their time engineering, not fighting tools. You will improve productivity through targeted automation and performance
• tuning, and
• serve as the escalation point when complex issues block the team.
• Deliver automation through scripts, templates, and design reuse

Optimize

• performance for large assemblies and overall system speed
• Define and deliver a training strategy for engineers and designers
• Act as escalation point for complex technical and system issues

Lead Transformation and Continuous Improvement

• This role is expected to lead, not just
• maintain . The bar is real, measurable productivity gains—not technology adoption for its own sake.
• Lead PLM modernization and upgrade initiatives
• Drive cloud CAD / SaaS adoption
• Advance the move to model-based engineering (MBE)
• Evaluate emerging engineering technologies (simulation, digital twins, MBE)
• Drive adoption of AI-accelerated CAD — generative and topology-optimized design, AI-assisted part search and design reuse, automated simulation setup, and intelligent validation — to compress design cycles, reduce duplicate parts, and scale engineering
• expertise

Identify

and deliver measurable productivity gains

Manage Vendors and Partners

Our engineering systems

• run on
• a network of external relationships, and you will own them—holding partners accountable to SLAs and continuously looking for ways to optimize cost without compromising capability.
• Manage external partners for CAD/PLM support, upgrades, and implementations
• Own strategic vendor relationships (Dassault, PTC, Siemens, Autodesk, etc.)
• Ensure SLA performance and cost optimization

Partner Across the Business

• Engineering systems do not exist in isolation. A central part of the job is translating business needs into system capabilities—and translating system constraints back into business-friendly language.
• Partner with engineering leadership on design organization needs
• Work with IT on infrastructure, security, and identity
• Align with supply chain and manufacturing on downstream data needs
• Translate business needs into system capabilities

What We're Looking For

Experience

• We are looking for someone with deep experience in engineering systems who has been through significant implementations from end to end.
• 8–12+ years in engineering systems, CAD administration, or PLM roles

Hands-on depth with one or more major platforms:

PTC Windchill / Creo

Siemens Teamcenter / NX

Dassault 3DEXPERIENCE / SolidWorks PDM

Proven

track record

leading system implementations or transformations

Technical Skills

• You should be technically credible across the full stack of engineering data—from CAD geometry through PLM lifecycle and into ERP integration—and comfortable getting hands-on with automation and configuration.
• Strong understanding of CAD data structures and large assembly management
• Working knowledge of PDM/PLM workflows and lifecycle models
• Practical experience with BOM management and ERP integration

Automation skills (Python, VBA, APIs)

• Experience with data governance and system configuration
• Familiarity with cloud/SaaS engineering platforms is a plus

Leadership and Business Skills

Above all, this

• role demands the ability to
• operate
• at both
• strategic and hands-on levels —able to build a multi-year roadmap one day and debug a complex configuration issue the next.

Strategic and hands-on

• able to set direction and execute against it
• Strong stakeholder management across Engineering, IT, and Operations
• Data-driven mindset with a focus on measurable outcomes
• Experience building roadmaps and business cases—and delivering against them