Technical Manager - Manchester

Technical Manager

Manchester

60k

The Company

Family owned companies can be a bit of a mixed bag.

 There’s a few typical scenarios. The workaholic tyrannical owner who shouting and screaming in fits of self righteous rage. The really lovely, sleepy little business who only hire once every Sheffield flood. The third generation owner who drops in by helicopter to give everyone a good shouting then disappear off into the clouds.

This one is kind of different. It’s family owned, but it’s first generation, so there’s no sense of entitlement. When I met some of the staff there, they told me that when they’ve been short staffed in the past, the MD has rolled up her sleeves and got on the line helping out.

I spoke to the technical assistant, who was a lovely man, and who has been at two other family owned businesses. He kept on talking about how nice a place it is to work, how everyone chips in.

The Job

You’re the technical manager onsite. It’s a business which is growing so there’s loads to do (I know everyone says this but they’ve gone from one to four units in the last few years and just put two new pieces of kit in, so it’s actually true in this case!).

You’ll have a Quality Manager, a Technical Assistant, some QAs, and even someone specific to manage audits and compliance for you.

It’s a chilled site and there’s about 120 people there. They reckon it’ll be another 12-18 months until they get their hands on another unit, which means more expansion.

So, basically, there’s loads to do, a bunch of support, and it’s a stable, nice place to come to work. Oh, and everyone is really down to earth and easy to talk to.

What you might not like

If the prestige of working for a massive bluechip business, so you can tell people you work for Unilever or whatever, then….well. This isn’t that. And because it’s a business of a few hundred people, you can’t just hide in an office and play with spreadsheets all day.

When I asked the people there, they said if they had to find a downside it was that at this exact moment, everything is pretty full. They’ve put the new kit in, they’ve got the staff, but they’re another 12-18 months away from getting the new unit. So your office isn’t a shiny corner office, it’s a box in an upgraded portacabin (for now).

You’ll be dealing with export as well, so there’s a a reasonable amount of work that comes with that. They’ve invested in really good tech, though, and the technical assistant was telling us how easy it is to deal with – click into this, click that, and there, all your provenance is sorted.

You

If you’ve worked with dairy, great.

The MD likes to see a CV with a proper narrative – the moves you’ve made make sense, you haven’t moved every year or so, and there are solid reasons for the moves you have made.

You’re comfortable with a growing business and want to get stuck in.

You’ll need to be an established technical manager.

And obviously, you’d need to be able to get to site. It’s pretty close to the motorway, though, so transport links are good.

The salary is up to 60k, so don’t apply if you’re wanting 75k or anything. Wouldn’t make sense.

If this sounds like the kind of place that you’d like to work at, send an email to lois.osborne@silven.co.uk or hit ‘apply’.

Extra points for a little cover letter saying why you’re a good fit. But that isn’t strictly necessary.