Erkrath, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany

Seco is a global metal cutting and machining solutions provider with a strong heritage in innovation, precision tools, and lasting partnerships. With sustainability at the heart of how we work, we help manufacturers solve complex challenges and shape the future of manufacturing through collaboration, technology, and customer-focused solutions.

Seco SOLVA is transforming manufacturing by going beyond cutting tools to deliver holistic, end-to-end solutions that improve efficiency, profitability, and competitiveness across the full production process. Built on Seco’s strong legacy, strategic partnerships, and innovative thinking, SOLVA helps manufacturers unlock their full potential through fast, easy, and sustainable solutions.

We are now looking for a Solva Regional Project Lead to lead the delivery of customer projects from agreed scope through execution, partnership, support, closure, and handover. In this role, you will coordinate cross-functional expertise, build trusted customer relationships, and help deliver measurable improvements in productivity, quality, cost, capacity, sustainability, and long‑term supportability.

Job Summary: ( Flexible location within East / Central Europe )

As Solva Regional Project Lead, you will support Solva offer development and lead the end-to-end delivery of complex customer projects as an experienced individual contributor. Working through the Solva Way of Working, you will connect Solva Business Development, regional sales, the Innovation Hub, local technical teams, customers, and partners to translate manufacturing challenges into structured opportunities and measurable outcomes. You will contribute to customer Discovery and Assessment, opportunity qualification, value cases, technical proposals, Statements of Work, risks, KPIs, and alignment before taking ownership of execution quality, governance, customer communication, milestones, escalation, closure, and sustainable handover to local Seco teams. Through cross-functional coordination, coaching, and consistent use of Solva tools and standards, you will help deliver improvements in productivity, cost per part, quality, process stability, capacity, sustainability, and long‑term supportability—without direct line‑management responsibility.

The role involves regional travel to support opportunity assessment, customer workshops, project implementation, partner engagement, and Solva governance activities.

This role reports to the Solva Global Project Manager

Key responsibilities of the role:

Support Solva Business Development and regional sales in qualifying opportunities that require integrated manufacturing outcomes rather than standalone tooling solutions.

Lead or support customer Discovery and Assessment activities covering capability, capacity, process efficiency, operational constraints, service needs, risks, and business opportunity.

Translate customer challenges into structured opportunity definitions, value hypotheses, assessment scopes, and proposal inputs.

Develop and review budgetary technical proposals, business cases, assumptions, risks, KPIs, and value propositions aligned with customer requirements and strategic goals.

Support Statements of Work, commercial discussions, staged deliverables, customer alignment, and handover from offer shaping into delivery execution.

Solva Delivery Leadership

Lead and govern complex Solva project delivery in line with the Solva Way of Working: Discovery, Assessment, Proposal, Agreement, Execution, Partnership, and Support.

Own execution quality, customer communication, action tracking, milestones, risk management, escalation, and delivery performance.

Ensure projects deliver measurable outcomes across productivity, cost per part, quality, process stability, capacity, sustainability, and long‑term supportability.

Coordinate Innovation Hub, application engineering, machining specialists, partners, suppliers, and local Seco teams.

Coach local Technical Sales Engineers, Account Managers, and Application Engineers to use Solva tools and sustain ownership after handover.

Ensure structured closure, lessons learned, case study capture, and handover to the local Seco organization.

Capability Support & Knowledge Sharing

Share practical Solva knowledge with local Technical Sales Engineers, Account Managers, Application Engineers, and project contributors to strengthen delivery capability and local ownership.

Promote consistent use of Solva tools, templates, project governance, reporting standards, customer communication routines, and action tracking.

Identify project needs, constraints, risks, specialist support requirements, and partner involvement to enable timely coordination and escalation.

Contribute to lessons learned, continuous improvement, safety, collaboration, and customer value creation.

Represent Solva as a senior customer‑facing project leader able to engage technical, operational, commercial, and senior management stakeholders.

Build trust by connecting technical recommendations to measurable customer business outcomes.

Support customer reviews, business reviews, project steering meetings, and strategic account discussions related to project performance or future opportunities.

Coach local account managers, technical sales engineers, and support teams to sustain customer relationships, KPIs, improvement actions, and long‑term partnership opportunities.

Operational Governance & Reporting

Maintain visibility of regional Solva project status, risks, workload, pipeline readiness, delivery capacity, and customer impact.

Drive consistent use of project tracking, action logs, dashboards, project files, documentation standards, and performance reporting.

Identify improvements that support Solva scalability, repeatability, delivery speed, governance, and customer experience.

Provide insights on regional capability gaps, project demand, competency needs, and future Solva operating‑model requirements.

Health, Safety, Environment, Quality & Compliance

Champion safe working practices for customer‑site assessments, trials, project implementation, partner involvement, and travel.

Ensure project work follows customer requirements, Seco procedures, the Sandvik Code of Conduct, legal obligations, quality expectations, and environmental responsibilities.

Promote risk awareness, audit readiness, traceability, and compliance across Solva project delivery and partner collaboration.

Act as a senior Seco and Solva ambassador, demonstrating accountability, customer focus, collaboration, and continuous improvement.

Skills and strengths we hope you bring

Demonstrated project leadership capability, including cross‑functional coordination, stakeholder alignment, action management, and structured handover.

Proven ability to operate across the full Solva lifecycle from Discovery and Assessment through Proposal, Agreement, Execution, Partnership, Support, and handover.

Strong manufacturing engineering knowledge covering machining, tooling, programming, process optimisation, cost per part, OEE, quality, and production stability.

Advanced project governance, risk management, customer communication, action tracking, reporting, prioritisation, resource coordination, and escalation management.

Ability to influence senior stakeholders and cross-functional teams without direct authority, manage conflict, and align contributors around customer and business outcomes.

Strong digital literacy, data analysis, commercial awareness, innovation mindset, and confidence using CRM, project tracking tools, dashboards, and Microsoft 365.

Fluent written and spoken English; additional regional languages are advantageous.

Behavior

Customer-focused and accountable, with a strong commitment to quality and measurable value creation.

Adaptable, collaborative, and resilient, with confidence to communicate risk and resolve delivery issues constructively.

Structured, proactive, safety‑conscious, and improvement‑oriented, with high standards of ethics, compliance, and attention to detail.

Commercially aware and innovative, with the ability to connect technical recommendations to strategic customer outcomes.

Qualification and Experience:

Bachelor’s degree in engineering, manufacturing, business, project management, or a related technical or commercial field, or equivalent relevant industry and leadership experience.

10+ years of experience in manufacturing engineering, technical project leadership, business development support, industrial solutions, application engineering, or a related customer‑facing technical environment.

Proven experience leading complex customer projects and coordinating cross‑functional technical contributors without direct line‑management responsibility.

Strong experience in machining process improvement, tooling strategy, production engineering, CAD/CAM, fixtures, partner coordination, or manufacturing optimisation.

Experience in value‑based, consultative, or solution‑selling environments, linking technical recommendations to measurable business outcomes.

Experience working with regional or global teams, customers, suppliers, and strategic partners.

Project Management, Agile, PMP, PRINCE2, Lean Six Sigma, continuous improvement, or manufacturing excellence certification is desirable.

Proficiency in Microsoft 365, CRM systems, project tracking tools, reporting dashboards, proposal writing, and structured project documentation.

Fluent English and a valid passport with willingness and ability to travel regionally and internationally; additional languages are advantageous.

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Sandvik Group