Director, Engineering, Utilities & Electrical

AbbVie•North Chicago, IL

2d•$160,500 - $305,000

About The Position

The Director, Utilities & Electrical provides strategic discipline leadership, people leadership, technical governance, and project enablement for electrical power systems, clean and black utilities, energy infrastructure, reliability, maintainability, electrical safety, and operational readiness within AbbVie Global Engineering. The role provides senior technical and organizational leadership for AbbVie’s global manufacturing network and strategic capital investments, including standards ownership, front-end engineering support, technical decision-making, project risk management, and disciplined execution across investment programs, manufacturing sites, and technology platforms. The Director leads and develops a global team of electrical and utilities technical experts, sets priorities and accountabilities, and ensures the organization has the capability and capacity to support brownfield expansions, modernization, debottlenecking, infrastructure upgrades, lifecycle asset replacement, and greenfield investments. As the senior Global Engineering authority for electrical and utilities strategy, the Director ensures systems are safe, compliant, resilient, energy efficient, maintainable, and able to meet current and future manufacturing needs. The role partners with Strategic Investments, project delivery teams, operations, quality, EHS, validation/CQV, site engineering, sustainability, digital/automation, and external engineering partners. It establishes and deploys global standards and governance; leads electrical and utilities scope for strategic capital investments; directs technical decisions and assurance reviews; develops organizational capability; oversees multiple projects and external partners; and communicates technical recommendations and risks to senior stakeholders. The position requires global travel to manufacturing sites, engineering partners, suppliers, and strategic project locations as needed; travel is listed as 25% of the time.

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering or a closely related engineering discipline.
Typically 15 or more years of progressive experience in electrical engineering, utilities engineering, manufacturing engineering, capital projects, or technical operations, including significant leadership responsibility.
Extensive experience in pharmaceutical, biopharmaceutical, API, peptide, biologics, sterile, or similarly regulated manufacturing environments.
Demonstrated experience leading electrical and utilities engineering scope for major brownfield and greenfield capital investments.
Proven experience leading and developing technical professionals, setting priorities, managing performance, and building organizational capability.
Demonstrated ability to direct multiple projects, sites, workstreams, and external engineering partners in a global matrix organization.
Strong technical knowledge of industrial electrical power distribution, emergency power, electrical safety, reliability, power-system studies, clean utilities, and black utilities.
Working knowledge of GMP, EHS, validation/CQV, commissioning, operational readiness, and regulated asset lifecycle requirements.
Strong commercial and financial acumen, including assessment of technical alternatives, lifecycle value, capital and operating costs, and business risk.
Demonstrated ability to make risk-based decisions, influence senior stakeholders, and provide concise executive recommendations.
Experience governing EPCM firms, design partners, equipment vendors, utilities specialists, and construction or commissioning organizations.
Strong communication, negotiation, stakeholder management, talent development, and structured problem-solving skills.
Ability to travel globally to manufacturing sites, engineering partners, suppliers, and strategic project locations as required.
Technical competencies include medium- and low-voltage power distribution; substations, transformers, switchgear, and motor-control systems; emergency power, standby generation, and UPS; grounding, lightning protection, electrical protection, and coordination; electrical safety, arc-flash risk, and hazardous-area interfaces; power quality, load studies, capacity planning, and system resilience; clean and black utilities; utility balances, redundancy philosophies, and lifecycle strategies; energy efficiency, sustainability, and infrastructure decarbonization; reliability, maintainability, and asset-management strategy; GMP engineering, validation/CQV, and operational readiness; global standards and design governance; front-end engineering and strategic capital investment; partner governance; technical risk management and executive decision support.
Leadership competencies include enterprise and strategic leadership; direct and matrix people leadership; talent development, succession planning, and performance management; portfolio prioritization and resource deployment; executive communication and influence; risk-based decision-making; accountability for technical and project outcomes; global cross-functional stakeholder leadership; partner and supplier governance; change leadership and organizational capability building; financial and commercial judgment; and commitment to safety, quality, compliance, and continuous improvement.

Nice To Haves

Master’s degree or relevant professional qualification.

Responsibilities

Establish, own, and deploy global engineering standards, design criteria, specifications, technical practices, and governance expectations for electrical power systems, utilities, energy infrastructure, reliability, maintainability, and electrical safety.
Serve as the senior discipline authority for material electrical and utilities decisions affecting safety, quality, compliance, cost, schedule, operability, resilience, and lifecycle value.
Define discipline strategies and multiyear capability roadmaps aligned with manufacturing network strategy, sustainability objectives, and strategic investment priorities.
Govern consistent application of standards, design principles, lessons learned, and engineering playbooks across regions, sites, and capital projects.
Establish assurance and review processes for technical quality at key project stage gates; lead resolution and escalation of significant discipline risks, standards deviations, and cross-project issues.
Represent Global Engineering in enterprise technical governance forums and provide clear recommendations to senior stakeholders.
Provide senior owner-side engineering leadership for electrical and utilities scopes of strategic capital investments, including new facilities, major capacity programs, technology platforms, infrastructure solutions, and lifecycle asset strategies.
Lead discipline input to front-end engineering, facility concepts, site master planning, investment option evaluations, business cases, and technology selection.
Define electrical and utilities design strategies, including power architecture, utility generation and distribution, redundancy, capacity, energy performance, maintainability, monitoring, and operational readiness.
Ensure discipline assumptions, deliverables, risks, interfaces, resources, and decisions are included in program plans, cost estimates, and execution strategies.
Establish project assurance priorities and direct technical reviews at concept, basic design, detailed design, construction, commissioning, and handover stages.
Balance safety, quality, compliance, reliability, sustainability, cost, and schedule in investment decisions; escalate material enterprise, program, or network decisions to the VP, Global Engineering and Strategic Investments leadership.
Lead technical decisions for medium- and low-voltage power distribution, substations, transformers, switchgear, motor control, emergency and standby power, UPS, grounding, lightning protection, and electrical protection systems.
Govern electrical safety, arc-flash risk, hazardous-area classification interfaces, protection coordination, power quality, system studies, and safe equipment lifecycle management.
Direct strategies for clean utilities, including purified water, water for injection, clean steam, process gases, and associated generation, storage, distribution, monitoring, and sanitization systems.
Direct strategies for black utilities, including plant steam, chilled water, cooling water, compressed air, nitrogen, natural gas, wastewater, and other supporting infrastructure.
Set expectations for system capacity, redundancy, resilience, reliability, maintainability, energy efficiency, and future expansion.
Ensure electrical and utilities systems are integrated with process, HVAC, mechanical, civil, structural, automation, instrumentation, and building-management systems.
Oversee technical reviews of load lists, single-line diagrams, utility balances, capacity models, equipment specifications, vendor packages, design calculations, and commissioning strategies.
Ensure engineering deliverables support GMP compliance, validation/CQV, safe operation, maintainability, sustainability, and effective site handover.
Drive timely resolution of complex technical issues and ensure decisions are documented, risk assessed, and communicated.
Lead, develop, and retain a high-performing global team of electrical, clean-utilities, and black-utilities technical experts.
Set direction, priorities, objectives, and performance expectations aligned with Global Engineering and Strategic Investments priorities.
Allocate technical resources across programs and sites based on business criticality, project risk, specialist capability, and portfolio demand.
Coach and mentor technical leaders and subject-matter experts; strengthen technical judgment, leadership capability, and succession readiness.
Establish development plans, knowledge-transfer mechanisms, and succession plans for critical electrical and utilities capabilities.
Build an inclusive, accountable, and collaborative culture focused on engineering excellence, safety, quality, and reliable delivery.
Clarify decision rights and interfaces between Global Engineering, site engineering, project teams, and external partners; use external specialists strategically while retaining owner-side knowledge and governance.
Provide discipline oversight across concurrent projects, manufacturing sites, and technology platforms; establish portfolio-level visibility of technical decisions, design maturity, risks, resource constraints, and assurance findings.
Work with project leadership to define discipline deliverables, review schedules, staffing needs, and escalation routes.
Hold EPCM firms, vendors, OEMs, and other engineering partners accountable for technical quality, standards compliance, and timely issue resolution.
Support sourcing strategies, framework agreements, vendor qualification, and technical bid evaluations; review supplier performance and lead corrective action where expectations are not met.
Ensure effective transition from project delivery to commissioning, qualification, operational readiness, and sustained manufacturing support.
Promote predictable delivery through standardization, reusable designs, disciplined change control, and early risk identification.
Partner with Strategic Investments, manufacturing operations, quality, validation/CQV, EHS, site engineering, MS&T, supply chain, finance, procurement, sustainability, digital/automation, and related engineering disciplines.
Integrate electrical and utilities decisions with manufacturing strategy, network capacity, regulatory expectations, technology deployment, and site handover requirements.
Influence senior stakeholders across functions, regions, and sites; facilitate collaboration across projects and sites to avoid fragmented solutions and unnecessary variation.
Represent Global Engineering in technical reviews, investment forums, risk discussions, and program governance.
Communicate complex technical matters in business terms, including impacts on safety, compliance, investment, schedule, resilience, and lifecycle performance.
Make enterprise-minded decisions that optimize outcomes across the manufacturing network; translate business and manufacturing strategies into discipline priorities, technical roadmaps, and executable plans.
Demonstrate visible leadership for safety, quality, compliance, integrity, and engineering excellence; provide direction in ambiguous or high-risk situations.
Build trusted relationships, develop organizational capability, make risks and trade-offs transparent, promote continuous improvement, and hold teams and partners accountable for commitments and delivery.