Vice President - Quality

Job Title: Vice President Quality

Job Category:

Quality

Job Level:

Level B

Job Location: Aiken, SC

Why Join Rolls-Royce?

At Rolls-Royce, we take pride in being a business that has played a pivotal role in shaping the modern world and remain dedicated to driving progress forward; powering, safeguarding, and connecting people across the globe. Joining Rolls-Royce means you will work on innovative, world-class engineering solutions, supported by a culture that values inclusion, creativity, and your ongoing professional development.

Role Overview:

The Vice President, Quality leads the North America Quality organization, including Production Quality, Reliability Engineering, and Emission Certification. This executive role defines and drives the region’s quality and product compliance strategy, ensuring alignment with customer expectations, regulatory requirements, and global standards. The role is accountable for delivering operational excellence, strengthening quality performance, and advancing a culture of continuous improvement across our U.S. sites of Aiken, SC and Mankato, MN.

Key Responsibilities:

• Lead the North America Quality organization, including Production Quality (Aiken & Mankato), Reliability Engineering, and Emission Certification.
• Define and execute quality strategy aligned to customer expectations, business goals, and continuous improvement objectives.
• Establish and maintain global quality standards and processes in line with ISO 9001 and Rolls-Royce Power Systems requirements.
• Ensure regulatory and product compliance, including leading emission requirements management across cross-functional teams.
• Drive quality performance and continuous improvement through data analytics, root cause analysis, and corrective action systems.
• Enable rapid and effective resolution of quality issues, including customer-facing concerns and field performance.
• Represent Rolls-Royce externally with customers, regulatory bodies, and industry authorities on quality and compliance matters.
• Lead organizational effectiveness, including talent development, culture (compliance and ethics), and financial stewardship (budgets, forecasts, productivity).

Position Requirements:

• Associate degree with 10 years of Engineering, Quality or Manufacturing Operations experience, OR
• Bachelor’s degree with 8 years of Engineering, Quality or Manufacturing Operations experience, OR
• Master’s degree with 6 years of Engineering, Quality or Manufacturing Operations experience, OR
• PhD degree with 3 years of Engineering, Quality or Manufacturing Operations experience, OR
• 12 years of Engineering, Quality or Manufacturing Operations experience in lieu of a degree
• Applicants must be authorized to work for any employer in the U.S without sponsorship. We are unable to sponsor or take over sponsorship of an employment Visa at this time.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Proven executive leadership in quality organizations, with deep expertise in structured problem-solving and continuous improvement methodologies (e.g., FMEA, PDCA, A3, 8D).
• Strong business and operational acumen, including production systems, cost management, Lean principles, and enterprise performance optimization.
• Demonstrated ability to lead complex, cross-functional initiatives in a global environment with strong communication and stakeholder engagement skills.
• Expertise in regulatory and product compliance, including emissions requirements and certification (e.g., EPA, CARB).
• Advanced capability to translate technical data and engineering concepts into business decisions, including interpretation of specifications and production requirements.
• Experience working within global organizations and cross-cultural environments; familiarity with American-German business practices and German language skills preferred.
• Proficiency in enterprise systems and tools (e.g., SAP, Microsoft ecosystem) to enable data-driven decision-making.
• Advanced degree (Master’s or MBA) preferred.

Our vision is to ensure that the excellence and ingenuity that shaped our history continues into our future. Our multi-year transformation program aims to turn Rolls-Royce into a high-performing, competitive, resilient and growing company. Join us, and it can be your future vision too.

Rolls-Royce is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to any protected characteristics.

At Rolls-Royce, we are committed to creating a workplace where all employees feel respected, supported, and empowered to do their best work. We foster a welcoming and innovative work environment that invests in you, giving you access to an incredible breadth and depth of opportunities where you can grow your career and make a difference.

Benefits

The Business Unit Power Systems of Rolls-Royce provides world-class power solutions and complete life-cycle support under our product and solution brand mtu. Through digitalization and electrification, we strive to develop drive and power generation solutions that are even cleaner and smarter and thus provide answers to the challenges posed by the rapidly growing societal demands for energy and mobility.

We deliver and service comprehensive, powerful and reliable systems, based on both gas and diesel engines, as well as electrified hybrid systems. These clean and technologically-advanced solutions serve our customers in the marine and infrastructure sectors worldwide.