3M Engineering: Manufacturing/Quality

3M manufacturing and quality engineers support the products, technologies and plants specific to a 3M business.  These professionals safely and efficiently deliver quality products to global 3M customers. Engineers work on projects to: increase capacities of existing products; create processes to produce new products; lower production costs and inventories; assure quality products expected by customers; and meet or exceed all safety, regulatory, plant and customer requirements. In addition, all manufacturing and quality engineers are expected to have strong skills in project management, lean manufacturing techniques and philosophy, and Lean Six Sigma.  In Canada, manufacturing and quality engineers are located at plant sites in London, Brockville and Perth, Ontario and in Morden, Manitoba.

Opportunities include:

Manufacturing Engineers

• Work to improve existing manufacturing processes and the running of experiments at pilot and production plants.
• Lead efforts for defining and establishing new product manufacturing operations.
• Lead efforts for defining and establishing new equipment design and technologies that will improve the cost, efficiency, safety or environmental requirements within a manufacturing operation.

Process Engineers

• Assist in the design, installation, optimization and validation of processes and equipment required for new product production.
• Ensure the equipment and processes installed in a plant have adequate capability to meet the business and technology needs for the product.
• Evaluate manufacturing options to optimize unit costs.
• Assure that ergonomic and safety factors exist within a given process area requiring interaction with the operation and all operators and maintenance staff.
• Work to improve supply chain processes in areas for which they are responsible.
• Have a keen understanding of the variables that affect processes and seek solutions assuring the lowest amounts of waste are generated as products are produced.

Product Engineers

• Design, prototype and evaluate products for existing and new business platforms.
• Develop an understanding of performance attributes of competitive products, demonstrate viable prototypes and interact with customers.
• Support the development of engineered materials required for developing unique and differentiated product solutions in ways that are cost effective and efficient.
• Document and update control plans and data with newly acquired information. Control key variables to optimize customer value through quality driven projects.

Quality Engineers

• Develop testing and procedures to assure new product compliance to customer requirements.
• Negotiate and manage the process of testing and conformance to specifications for incoming raw materials to the manufacturing sites.
• Manage statistical analysis that identifies anomalies, recurring problems, outliers and other forms to statistical process control of the operations within a plant.
• Work with plants, suppliers and customers to assure product quality processes are in place.
• Serve as the customer advocate to the business; protect the 3M brand image.
• Work with product and process engineers to assure an effective Management of Change process for all modifications.
• Support ‘Run-to-Target,’ ‘Zero Defect’ and ‘Lean’ approaches, all of which focus on optimizing quality for customer satisfaction.
• Implement quality systems that become embedded in the culture of the process.

Safety Engineers

• Provide safety and environmental consulting services to an assigned location.
• Proactively assure that plants and laboratories are operating to compliance with: safety, health and environmental regulations, corporate policies, product responsibility assurance regarding existing and new materials, and products and technologies of importance to the business unit.

Facilities/Maintenance Engineers

• Provide facility-wide support to the maintenance functions of the equipment within a site.
• Consult on the maintenance operations of specific pieces of equipment.
• Oversee the use of utilities and recommend improvements to reduce cost while assuring compliance with all safety, health and environmental regulations.

All Positions

• Assignments are based at 3M Canada Plant Locations.
• Candidates should demonstrate excellent interpersonal, oral and written communication skills. Ideal candidates will be interested in working in manufacturing operations with some prior experience in a manufacturing plant. In addition, the interviewers will be looking for the leadership qualities necessary for developing project assignments, guiding employees, developing teams of widely diverse perspectives and completing assignments.