Staff Quality & Reliability Engineer

Divergent is building the new industrial age. Every day, our teams design, manufacture, and assemble advanced systems for some of the world’s most demanding industries. Our integrated engineering and manufacturing platform transforms complex designs into production-ready solutions, helping customers move faster, build smarter, and deliver critical systems when they matter most. Divergent is a qualified Tier 1 supplier to global automotive OEMs and supports leading U.S. aerospace and defense companies. Join us and help push the boundaries of what can be built. Purpose As Staff Quality & Reliability Engineer, you will lead the resolution of Divergent’s complex and systemic machine reliability challenges across the additive manufacturing fleet. You will drive issues from escalation through root cause, engineering solution, and validated closure, while ensuring recurring failures are translated into durable technical improvements. This role operates across Machine Development, Product Support Engineering, Service, Production, and engineering SMEs to convert fleet experience into stronger design requirements, engineering standards, validation strategies, and future machine capabilities. The Staff, Quality & Reliability Engineer combines deep technical problem solving with systems thinking, cross-functional leadership, and the ability to drive reliability improvements throughout the product lifecycle. The Role Own Reliability Issue Intake, Triage, & Prioritization • Screen, triage, group, organize, and support prioritization of engineering escalations based on fleet impact, recurrence, severity, and business need. • Determine the appropriate engineering ownership and engage the required SMEs across Hardware, Automation & Controls, Materials & Processes, MDE, Software, and Supplier Quality. • Drive clarity in clear ownership, priority, status, and next actions for open reliability issues. • Ensure engineering escalations move quickly from identification to actionable investigation. Coordinate & Support Root Cause & Corrective Action • Drive and support coordination of complex and cross-functional RCCAs for recurring, systemic, and machine-level failures. • Cultivate a problem-solving culture that looks beyond symptoms to identify and understand true root cause. • Challenge assumptions, identify gaps in evidence, and ensure technical conclusions are supported by data. Drive Engineering Issues Through Validated Closure • Coordinate with SMEs to develop engineering solutions and drive actions through completion. • Provide guidance and support evidence generation to demonstrate that a corrective action sufficiently resolves the issue. • Ensure technical debt is closed by ensuring the identification of root cause, the development of engineering solutions, and the validation that solutions correct the issue. • Track aging and closure of engineering actions. Inform Future Product Design • Support the generation of engineering standards and requirements generation throughout the product lifecycle informed by reliability learnings Technical Leadership & Engineering Excellence • Serve as a technical leader for reliability problems that span multiple engineering disciplines and organizational boundaries. • Create alignment when ownership or technical direction is unclear and drive teams toward decisions based on evidence. • Communicate reliability risks, technical findings, tradeoffs, and recommended actions clearly to engineering and business leadership. • Improve the mechanisms, metrics, and processes used to manage engineering reliability issues and create a sustainable reliability function. Basic Qualifications • Ability to lawfully access information and technology that is subject to US export controls • Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Mechatronics, Manufacturing Engineering, Systems Engineering, or a related technical field. • 6+ years of experience in machine development, reliability engineering, manufacturing engineering, equipment engineering, or a related discipline. • Demonstrated experience leading complex root cause investigations and corrective actions on electromechanical or automated equipment. • Strong understanding of structured problem-solving methodologies such as RCCA, 8D, fault-tree analysis, FMEA, DOE, or equivalent methods. • Experience working across mechanical, electrical, controls, software, manufacturing, and/or process engineering disciplines. • Ability to interpret machine and production data, distinguish correlation from root cause, and translate findings into engineering action. • Demonstrated ability to independently drive technically ambiguous, cross-functional problems through resolution. • Strong written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to communicate technical problems and risk to both technical and non-technical stakeholders. Preferred Qualifications • 8+ years of experience developing, sustaining, or improving complex industrial equipment or automated manufacturing systems. • Experience with high-complexity capital equipment, laser powder bed fusion additive manufacturing, industrial automation, robotics, additive manufacturing, semiconductor equipment, aerospace manufacturing, or similar systems. • Experience owning reliability across a fleet of machines rather than resolving issues on a single piece of equipment. • Experience using fleet health, downtime, utilization, failure-rate, or maintenance data to prioritize engineering work. • Experience defining reliability requirements, validation criteria, or qualification strategies for new machine designs and engineering changes. • Demonstrated technical leadership at the Staff level, including influencing teams and driving decisions without direct authority. • Experience establishing or scaling reliability engineering processes, issue-management systems, engineering standards, or technical-debt reduction mechanisms. Work Environment • Onsite Pay Range $148,430—$204,090 USD What We Offer: • Holistic Compensation Package: Enjoy a world-class compensation package that includes a competitive salary, equity plan, and discretionary results-based incentive bonus opportunities, ensuring you're truly valued for your contributions. • Wellness and Time Off: Embrace a healthy lifestyle with paid vacation, sick time, and company holidays, including a year-end shutdown to recharge. We support growing families with paid parental leave, recognizing the importance of bonding time. • Comprehensive Health and Wellness: Prioritize your well-being with our comprehensive health and wellness benefits, offering both HMO and Premium PPO options. Additionally, benefit from company-sponsored life insurance and short and long-term disability coverage for peace of mind. • Investment in Growth: We're committed to your professional development. Take advantage of reimbursement opportunities for learning and development initiatives, empowering you to continuously expand your skill set and reach peak performance. • Collaborative and High-Performing Environment: Join our collaborative, dynamic, and high-performing team within a fast-paced, mission-driven company. Together, we're disrupting the traditional manufacturing industry, fostering innovation, and integrating people and technology to reduce our footprint. Equal Employment Opportunity Divergent is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age, disability or veteran status, or any other applicable state or federal protected characteristic. Divergent provides affirmative action in employment for qualified Individuals with Disabilities and Protected Veterans in compliance with Section 503 of the Rehabilitation Act and the Vietnam Era Veterans’ Readjustment Assistance Act. EEO Poster In order to adjust to changes in our business, it may become necessary to add, remove or modify certain duties and responsibilities, or to reassign you to another job position. From time to time you may be asked to work on special projects or to assist with other work. Your cooperation and assistance in performing such additional work is expected. E-Verify: Right to Work Our company participates in E-Verify. E-Verify is a program that electronically confirms a candidate’s eligibility to work in the United States after completing the Employment Eligibility Verification (Form I-9). The information provided on the Form I-9 is compared to the records contained in the Social Security Administration and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) databases. This helps employers verify the identity and employment eligibility of newly hired employees. Eligibility to Work Poster (English) | Eligibility to Work Poster (Spanish) Los Angeles Fair Chance Initiative for Hiring Ordinance (FCIHO) Pursuant to the Los Angeles Fair Chance Initiative for Hiring Ordinance (FCIHO), we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records. No agencies, no solicitations, and no calls please.