Product & Program Transition Leader

Ford • Dearborn, MI

4d • $115,500 - $218,100 • Hybrid

About The Position

In this position, be at the forefront of Ford's product transformation! We are seeking a highly specialized and experienced Product Structure Transformation Lead to spearhead a critical, company-wide initiative focused on fundamentally reshaping Ford's product data landscape. This role offers a unique opportunity to define the future of Ford's product data through the application of advanced architectural principles and the development of intelligent, programmatic solutions. The ideal candidate will be a seasoned architect with a deep, nuanced understanding of complex product structures, proven expertise in data transformation, and a profound grasp of product architectural elements and their underlying logic. This role requires a scientific and focused approach to decompose, define, and translate intricate product data. Responsibilities include in-depth analysis of current product data architectures, defining foundational elements, meticulously mapping data to a future state, developing sophisticated transformation logic, and collaborating with cross-functional teams to execute this precise data transformation at scale using programmatic accelerators.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in engineering, Computer Science, or a related highly analytical field.
• 10-15 years of progressive experience in product architecture, complex data transformation, or related fields, with a significant emphasis on product structure definition and management.
• Profound understanding and hands-on experience with product architectural elements, including homogeneous and modular architectures.
• Demonstrated knowledge of platform engineering constructs, design structure metrics, associated product family design, and modular function deployment.
• Expertise in mass customization concepts and the ability to define and implement strategies for managing product variety.
• Proven capability to create indices to measure the cost of variety within product portfolios.
• In-depth knowledge of product development processes and product data release frameworks.
• Mastery of deep principles of rule engines used for defining and managing complex product configurations and relationships.
• Extensive experience with and understanding of transformation logic for large-scale data translation and system integration.
• Ability to architect how platforms, models, and products are structured and how configurations are created.
• Exceptional ability to understand and define complex data elements and data architectures.
• Experience with data strategy and transformational frameworks specific to product data.
• Proven ability to build logical structures and constructs for intricate transformation logics.
• Strong experience with data modeling and analysis, especially for product lifecycle management (PLM) data.
• Comprehensive understanding of PLM systems and their integration with product definition processes.
• Ability to interpret and utilize data generated from 3DX applications.
• Track record of leading large-scale, complex digital transformation initiatives, particularly those involving core product data.
• Ability to drive business adoption of large-scale transformation, plan for training and ensure smooth adoption of new tools
• Proven ability to lead and manage cross-functional teams in a highly technical and analytical environment.
• Excellent communication, collaboration, and advanced problem-solving skills, with the ability to articulate complex technical concepts clearly.
• Exceptional abstract thinking and whiteboarding skills for conceptualizing and designing complex architectural solutions.
• Significant experience in an engineering and manufacturing environment, ideally within a large-scale product development organization.

Nice To Haves

• Direct experience within the automotive industry.
• Experience with Product & Bill of Material (EBOM, MBOM, & BOP) structures and processes.
• Master's degree in a relevant technical or engineering field.
• Working knowledge of 3DX software.
• Experience with change management and other business management initiatives related to large-scale transformations.

Responsibilities

• Conduct comprehensive analysis of existing product structures, identifying architectural patterns, data flows, and interdependencies.
• Decompose complex product structures into foundational data objects and elemental components (e.g., entities, business objects, relationships, data fields).
• Determine value-added vs. non-value-added entities within the current product data landscape, guiding optimization efforts.
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams to define the desired future product structure, incorporating advanced architectural principles.
• Understand and define decomposed elemental datasets required for the future state product architecture.
• Meticulously map current state product data elements to future state elements, ensuring precise translation paths.
• Develop sophisticated transformation logic and translate these into robust, scalable "programmatic accelerators" for automated data processing.
• Oversee and execute the translation of current state product datasets into future state datasets at scale, leveraging developed accelerators.

Benefits

• Immediate medical, dental, vision and prescription drug coverage
• Flexible family care days, paid parental leave, new parent ramp-up programs, subsidized back-up child care and more
• Family building benefits including adoption and surrogacy expense reimbursement, fertility treatments, and more
• Vehicle discount program for employees and family members and management leases
• Tuition assistance
• Established and active employee resource groups
• Paid time off for individual and team community service
• A generous schedule of paid holidays, including the week between Christmas and New Year’s Day
• Paid time off and the option to purchase additional vacation time.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Manager