Who You Are

You're a highly operational & empathetic leader with the skills to drive a cross-functional team to successfully deploy Sila’s material into vehicle and consumer OEMs products. Your work will include understanding customer requirements, shaping the commercial program, and then leading the battery engineering, customer programs and sales operations teams to deliver on the program. Your role will interface closely with the account managers, because you and your team will be delivering upon the business they win. You are the one that executes on the promises we make to our customers.

Responsibilities & Duties

• Responsible for leading a 20+ member high performance team of engineers and customer program managers delivering on the technical work needed to capture, retain and grow business at our premium auto and consumer customers
• Lead the Battery Engineering team to proactively collaborate with the Product Management and Product Development teams to understand internal development and match it with customer needs  
• Lead the customer program managers for the work needed to support the customer.  Collaborate to set the project plans and timelines with concrete steps and goals. 
• Own demand forecast planning
• Get buy-in from colleagues. Set goals, implement actions and measure results.  Delegate much of the tactical work, but initially, also work hands-on where needed
• Create a Sales Process function to support Salesforce input, invoicing, order confirmations, RMAs. Generate account/market reports for internal discussion.
• Create dashboards for price summaries, qualification timelines, quantity requirements, etc.
• Invest in our company values and vision and champion them as we grow

Knowledge & Skills

• Strong experience managing engineering teams and/or program managing in B2B environments in which the products require integration and the sales and implementation cycles are long and complex.
• Deep technical background with demonstrated ability to understand complex technology products and markets
• Understanding of how the auto supply chain business operates would be helpful
• Good understanding of how the sales process works
• Understanding of batteries would be a big plus, but not required.  
• Comfortable generating, interpreting, and presenting data and reports both internally and externally that are informative and build trust.
• Demonstrated ability to collaborate with a wide array of personalities and stakeholders, driving alignment, prioritization, and progress in rapidly changing situations
• At least 10 years of industry experience.

Physical Demands & Work Conditions

• International travel will be required