Design Standard Lead

JBT Marel•Redmond, WA

2d•Onsite

About The Position

At JBT Marel, we are seeking a visionary Design Standards Lead to define and drive our global design standards strategy across the organization. This role is responsible for establishing the governance, frameworks, and collaborative ways of working that transform design standards from technical requirements into strategic business enablers. By creating alignment across products, platforms, and solutions, the Design Standards Lead will help reduce complexity, improve scalability, enhance the customer experience, and strengthen JBT Marel's position as a leading full-line solutions provider. Success in this role requires building strong cross-functional partnerships and leading a global community of stakeholders across Innovation, Product Management, Supply Chain, Service, Software, Engineering, and other key functions. The scope spans hardware, mechanical and electrical design, automation, software platforms, human-machine interfaces, user experience, and customer-facing product solutions. The Design Standards Lead will drive consistency where it delivers value while ensuring strategic differentiation remains a competitive advantage where appropriate.

Requirements

A relevant university degree, preferably at Master's level, within engineering, industrial engineering, mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, product development, innovation management or a related field.
Minimum five years of experience in product development, engineering, design standards, platform development, product architecture, modularization, category management or a related technical or strategic role.
Strong strategic thinking with the ability to connect technical standards to business value.
Excellent communication, facilitation and stakeholder management skills.
Ability to influence across functions, divisions and professional disciplines without relying only on formal authority.
Strong understanding of product development, engineering processes, platform thinking, modularization and portfolio complexity.
Ability to balance standardization and flexibility pragmatically.
Excellent problem-solving and analytical skills.
Structured, persistent and capable of driving progress in a global matrix organization.
Comfortable working with both technical detail and executive-level direction.
Strong sense of customer value, usability, operational impact and lifecycle thinking.
Collaborative mindset with the ability to create trust, shared ownership and an active community around design standards.
Experience working in a global, multi-site and multi-cultural organization.
Proven ability to partner effectively with a wide variety of stakeholder groups in a corporate context.
Excellent English skills, both written and verbal.

Nice To Haves

Experience from equipment manufacturing, food processing machinery, industrial automation or another complex B2B manufacturing environment is an advantage.
Experience working across hardware, electrical, automation, software or user interface domains is an advantage.
Strong understanding of how design standards influence product complexity, supply chain efficiency, serviceability, compliance, manufacturability and customer experience.
Knowledge of compliance, safety, hygienic design, sustainability or regulatory requirements in machinery design is an advantage.

Responsibilities

Build and govern the direction for category management, where technical direction, preferred solutions and design boundaries are set in collaboration with Innovation and Supply Chain. Alignment should be a conscious choice, not a default assumption.
Act as a key collaborator across divisions to align design standards with broader innovation roadmaps, platform strategies, modularization principles and integrated solution offerings.
Champion design clarity as a strategic enabler by establishing transparent guidelines that help teams understand when to align for a cohesive cross-portfolio experience, and when differentiation serves the customer or product better.
Own, develop and maintain the global design standards framework for JBT Marel.
Define and facilitate the governance model for design standards, including roles, responsibilities, decision rights, review cadence, ownership and approval processes.
Drive alignment across divisions on common design principles, platforms, modules, interfaces and technical direction.
Establish clear guidelines for when standardization is required, when harmonization is beneficial and when differentiation is justified.
Collaborate closely with Innovation and Supply Chain to set direction and boundaries for category management, preferred components and platform principles.
Align design standards with product roadmaps, innovation priorities, modularization strategies and full-line solution development.
Facilitate cross-functional design standard forums, key user groups, expert communities and regular alignment meetings throughout the year.
Build and strengthen a global design standards community across Innovation and supply chain.
Ensure relevant standards cover hardware, electrical architecture, automation, software platforms, user interfaces, hygienic design, safety, serviceability, manufacturability, sustainability, and compliance.
Identify areas where lack of standardization creates unnecessary cost, risk, complexity, inefficiency or inconsistent customer experience.
Support the development of common design libraries, templates, guidelines and decision tools.
Create a clear process for maintaining, updating, communicating and retiring design standards.
Support integration between legacy JBT and legacy Marel ways of working by identifying best practices and scaling them where relevant.
Provide recommendations to leadership on design standard priorities, risks, gaps and opportunities.
Track progress of design standards initiatives and secure momentum across functions and divisions.