Associate Engineering Manager/Staff Test Engineer – Vehicle Component Testing (m/f/d)

What To Expect

Tesla’s Vehicle Component and Hardware Test team is looking for a skilled and motivated staff test engineer or engineering manager to lead individuals in a small team.

Your mission is to lead staff who work on chassis, structural testing as well as vehicle component testing (Thermals, Seats, Closures, etc.) during durability, performance and reliability test projects. You and your team thus own and contribute to design and product validations.

You will join at the inception of labs and teams. You’ll have autonomy to define test benches, lead test initiatives, improve methodologies, and mentor junior engineers, while influencing design of next-generation vehicles through data-driven insights.

We’re looking for a highly motivated SENIOR engineer with strong technical fundamentals, hands-on experience in vehicle and/or component-level testing, and a passion for problem-solving in a fast-paced, collaborative environment.

What You'll Do

• Participate in as much testing as time allows, in order to understand test equipment and product behavior and become grounded in lab operations.
• Serve as the senior technical authority for questions and problems.
• Manage lab resources, budgets, and workflows to drive efficiency, quality improvements, and innovation in test methodologies.
• Define test plans, articles, methods and equipment; propose design of experiments to better understand observations.
• Conceptualize, design, assemble and commission test benches and associated software environments. Perform risk assessments, review norms & standards to ensure that equipment designs comply with Health, Safety, CE and Environmental standards.
• Serve as a team leader: Allocate, manage and control tasks, goals and responsibilities and hold team accountable. Be responsible for the lab space, equipment, safety, quality, timeliness and morale.
• Train staff to operate and troubleshoot test equipment; ensure training content was learned.
• Enforcement of and compliance with occupational health & safety; chemical & environmental, electrical protection guidelines. If needed, introduce and implement relevant measures e.g. through creation of risk assessments.
• Own and allocate organizational tasks & responsibilities like creation and maintenance of procedures, SOPs, standards, equipment, inspections, lab commissioning, facilities, maintenance and staff trainings.
• If required for a task: Ability to work with hazardous materials, high-voltage and other hazardous energy using mandated PPE and procedures after having received training.
• Other tasks as required.

What You'll Bring

• A technical background in component or vehicle testing or automated machinery development with at least 4 years of experience in hands-on testing, commissioning, validation and some Failure Modes and Effects Analysis (FMEA).
• Engineering Degree in Mechanical, Electrical or Mechatronics Engineering, Aerospace Engineering, Automation technology, Robotics or equivalent degree with a hands-on mindset and hands-on experience.
• Proven track record as a hands-on test engineer (test planning, development, execution, inspections, root cause analysis, data processing, report writing) with experiences from which junior staff can learn from.
• >4 Years of relevant work experience including at least 2 years in a supervisory or managerial role. Proven achievements in coaching and development of people.
• Strong organizational and strategic thinking skills, with experience in budgeting, resource allocation, and driving quality/efficiency projects in a lab or testing environment.
• Ability to adapt to a constantly changing environment with new technologies, equipment and processes.
• Analytical, structured, independent, team and goal-oriented work style combined with high flexibility.

Additional Preferred Skills

• Coding experience with Python, Pytest, Git, and/or C is a plus.
• 3D CAD skills (CATIA preferred) and ability to design and build test benches is a plus.
• Experience with drawing PIDs and single wire diagrams is a plus.
• Driving license Class B valid in Germany is a plus.
• Fluent German language skills are a plus.
• Experience with structural simulations (ANSYS) and Finite Element Analysis is a plus
• Experience with application and enforcement of German standards for safety (ASR/TRGS/TRBS/DGUV/VDE/DIN etc.) and proven ability to transfer standards into actionable tasks and outcomes is a plus.

Tesla