Sourcing Engineer / Technical Product Manager SUPERSTAR

THE NO-NONSENSE SUMMARY: This posi­tion is intend­ed for tech­ni­cal pro­fes­sion­als who love to both be very orga­nized and learn about new tech­nolo­gies and how our mate­ri­als can be used in their appli­ca­tions. Report­ing to the Mar­ket­ing Man­ag­er, you will work close­ly with CAPLINQ’s sup­pli­ers to make sure that all prod­uct infor­ma­tion is accu­rate, up-to-date, online, and read­i­ly avail­able for both cus­tomers and the sales team. You also sup­port these prod­ucts tech­ni­cal­ly, train­ing sales and appli­ca­tions engi­neers to sell these prod­ucts and ensur­ing that prices meet GM objectives.

DESIRED OUTCOMES

• Add a min­i­mum of 2 prod­uct cat­e­gories & 100 products/year for the next 3 years
• All pos­si­ble prod­ucts from all exist­ing sup­pli­ers and ven­dors are avail­able online
• All prod­ucts cat­e­gories & prod­ucts are updat­ed and main­tained with all rel­e­vant prod­uct & price info

CANDIDATE COMPETENCIES | Can­di­date is able to:

• Clear­ly artic­u­late the prod­ucts’ main fea­tures, and cap­ture or cre­ate text and images to match 
• Under­stand prod­uct tech­nolo­gies and effec­tive­ly trans­late their USPs into mar­ket­ing artifacts
• Work effec­tive­ly with pro­duc­tion & sup­pli­ers to get the required infor­ma­tion to pro­mote and sell products
• Work effec­tive­ly with team mem­bers & teach, train, and sup­port them on prod­ucts, sys­tems, and tools
• Ensure that prod­uct port­fo­lio is cur­rent, com­plete, accu­rate­ly priced correctly
• Rec­og­nize and devel­op sup­pli­ers & prod­uct cat­e­gories that will prof­itably add to our prod­uct portfolio

THE ROLE
Yes, you read that right – we’re look­ing for a SUPERSTAR. Our cus­tomers require tech­ni­cal infor­ma­tion pre­sent­ed to them in a man­ner that they can com­pre­hend and apply, and we are seek­ing some­one who can both col­lect, pro­duce and orga­nize this type of infor­ma­tion as well as teach and train the sales teams to pro­vide this type of support.

To do this, you will work close­ly with the sales and mar­ket­ing team as well as with our ven­dors, some of which are Chi­nese speak­ing, so it would be very help­ful (though not an absolute require­ment) if the per­son spoke any lev­el of Mandarin.

As a fast-grow­ing multi­na­tion­al, our prod­ucts are used across a range of indus­tries, includ­ing semi­con­duc­tors, eMo­bil­i­ty, renew­able ener­gy, and elec­tron­ics assem­bly. Your suc­cess in this posi­tion will hinge on your abil­i­ty to cre­ate and man­age all prod­uct con­tent, includ­ing descrip­tions, appli­ca­tions, prices, tech­ni­cal details, spec­i­fi­ca­tions, and selec­tor guides. Ensur­ing accu­ra­cy and cur­ren­cy of online prod­uct infor­ma­tion is a key respon­si­bil­i­ty. Your atten­tion to detail and col­lab­o­ra­tion with ven­dors will be vital in effec­tive­ly com­mu­ni­cat­ing prod­uct content.

Does this type of work inspire and moti­vate you? Then I encour­age you to read on. If on the oth­er hand, you’re already exhaust­ed read­ing this, I rec­om­mend you take a nap and check out anoth­er job post.

So, what will you be doing?

The posi­tion and respon­si­bil­i­ty will grow along with you. As a small, but fast-grow­ing com­pa­ny, the role will be excit­ing for you if you like work­ing in a small team and hav­ing a lot of free­dom to define your roles and responsibilities. 

Broad­ly speak­ing, your work will revolve around the fol­low­ing three activities:

1. Work with sup­pli­ers and our own tech­ni­cal ser­vice to gath­er all avail­able infor­ma­tion (~40% of your time)
You will col­lab­o­rate with sup­pli­ers and ven­dors to gath­er com­pre­hen­sive infor­ma­tion. This will involve proac­tive­ly col­lect­ing data and doc­u­men­ta­tion relat­ed to prod­ucts, pric­ing, spec­i­fi­ca­tions, avail­abil­i­ty, and oth­er cru­cial details.

Exam­ples of activities:

• Col­lab­o­rate with sup­pli­ers and ven­dors to gath­er com­pre­hen­sive information.
• Proac­tive­ly col­lect data and doc­u­men­ta­tion relat­ed to prod­ucts, pric­ing, spec­i­fi­ca­tions, avail­abil­i­ty, and oth­er cru­cial details.
• Build strong rela­tion­ships with sup­pli­ers and ven­dors to facil­i­tate effec­tive com­mu­ni­ca­tion and collaboration.
• Plan and exe­cute tests at sup­pli­ers or third par­ties to ensure prod­uct qual­i­ty and performance.
• Get test results from sales, tech­ni­cal ser­vice & sup­pli­ers, san­i­tize them, and repur­pose them for Caplin­q’s use.

2. Gen­er­ate con­tent online for both cus­tomers as well as for sales team (~30% of your time)
Col­lab­o­rat­ing with cross-func­tion­al teams, you will cre­ate online and cus­tomer-fac­ing con­tent, such as prod­uct descrip­tions, tech­ni­cal specs, user guides, and mul­ti­me­dia mate­ri­als that will help cus­tomers under­stand both how our prod­ucts work and how they can be used in cus­tomer applications.

Exam­ples of activities:

• Work with sup­pli­ers, sales, and tech­ni­cal ser­vice to cre­ate prod­uct descrip­tions that accu­rate­ly con­vey prod­uct fea­tures and benefits.
• Cre­ate prod­uct cat­a­logs, selec­tor guides, deci­sion trees, com­par­i­son charts, and data tables.
• Cre­ate datasheets, appli­ca­tion notes, user guides, and train­ing modules.
• Cre­ate pre­sen­ta­tion slides and oth­er mar­ket­ing mate­ri­als that show­case prod­uct uses.
• Fig­ure out how to put all these arti­facts online in a way that edu­cates cus­tomers and salespeople.

3. Present tech­ni­cal con­tent gen­er­at­ed to cus­tomers, tech ser­vice & sales (~30% of your time)
You will present the tech­ni­cal con­tent you cre­ate to many stake­hold­ers, effec­tive­ly com­mu­ni­cat­ing com­plex infor­ma­tion in a clear and con­cise man­ner to pro­mote our prod­ucts. Ide­al­ly, you will be able to do this direct­ly with what you have cre­at­ed online.

Exam­ples of activities:

• Pre­sent­ing your tech­ni­cal con­tent to cus­tomers, tech ser­vice, and sales.
• Com­mu­ni­cat­ing com­plex infor­ma­tion con­cise­ly using appro­pri­ate techniques/tools.
• Artic­u­lat­ing prod­uct fea­tures, ben­e­fits, and appli­ca­tions compellingly.
• Assist­ing cus­tomers, tech ser­vice, and sales in under­stand­ing and pro­mot­ing products.
• Deliv­er­ing engag­ing pre­sen­ta­tions to dri­ve cus­tomer inter­est and sales.

DESIRED SKILLS AND EXPERIENCE 

What mind­set do you require?
Skills can be learned. Mind­sets, though they can be learned too, are more often a part of who you are. We val­ue the mind­set at least, if not more, than either expe­ri­ence or hard skills.

1. Curios­i­ty – We want a per­son who is curi­ous and hun­gry. Google is your best friend, and you might be secret­ly addict­ed to get­ting as much infor­ma­tion as you can. Some­times you Google too much 😉
2. Data-dri­ven – Our cul­ture is a mer­i­toc­ra­cy. It encour­ages and rewards deci­sions that are made with data as opposed to senior­i­ty, intu­ition, or per­son­al experience.
3. Con­tin­u­ous Improve­ment – Peo­ple and process­es can always get bet­ter. We’re look­ing for some­one who ques­tions every process to see if there’s no room for improve­ment. Like­wise, if you want to improve your­self, we offer mon­ey to sup­port your con­tin­u­ous learn­ing journey.
4. Courage – Boss­es make mis­takes and col­leagues aren’t always fair. That’s life. We’re look­ing for some­one who may be afraid to con­front these issues, but does it anyway.

What skills do you NOT need?
Before we list the skills you do need, it is impor­tant that you know what skills or expe­ri­ence we do NOT require:

1. Com­plete Prod­uct Knowl­edge – You do not need to be a tech­ni­cal mas­ter with all the prod­ucts we cur­rent­ly offer. If you want to learn, that is more important.
2. Lots of work expe­ri­ence: This is meant to be an mid-lev­el posi­tion where you will learn “knowl­edge” on the job. What we can’t teach – and val­ue enor­mous­ly is some­one that is orga­nized, ana­lyt­i­cal, curi­ous, ded­i­cat­ed and get­ting all our info online.

What skills do you require?

We don’t even have any hard skills that are required. The ide­al can­di­date would be one who:

• • Has a tech­ni­cal degree or equiv­a­lent expe­ri­ence in Engi­neer­ing, or a Bach­e­lor of Science
  • Is skilled at cre­at­ing and orga­niz­ing tech­ni­cal content
  • Asks ques­tions, then asks more ques­tions, then asks even more questions
  • Is very orga­nized, and likes to have a place for every­thing and every­thing in its place
  • Is very com­put­er lit­er­ate, and knows their way around Google Docs, Sheets & Slides (or Microsoft)
  • Is a Google (and Chat­G­PT) pow­er-user, for­ev­er ask­ing Google ques­tions to get new answers 
  • Has a pro­fes­sion­al lev­el of writ­ten and spo­ken Eng­lish (at least 9/10)
  • Is opti­mistic, ener­getic, and loves to smile
  • Pays atten­tion to detail. The very last para­graph of this job vacan­cy has very impor­tant infor­ma­tion. Be sure you read it twice before applying.

Skills not required, but that get bonus points (any of them count):

The job we have in mind may not require these skills, but they sure come in handy around here.

1. An Engi­neer­ing Degree: You do not need to be an engi­neer, but our prod­ucts are by nature tech­ni­cal, so you will need to be able to grasp the con­cepts. If you want to learn, we’re able to teach.
2. Flu­en­cy in Man­darin: We have sev­er­al Chi­nese speak­ing sup­pli­ers; it’d be handy if you could com­mu­ni­cate with them in their native lan­guage and cre­ate con­tent in English.
3. Love mar­ket research: There is always so much to learn in our indus­try. If you love to dig into the details and then can sum­ma­rize what you’ve learned in Pow­er­Point or sim­i­lar, we can use that too

WHY WORK FOR CAPLINQ?

1. Col­lab­o­rate with out­stand­ing peo­ple: We hire only the best. Our stan­dards are high and our employ­ees enjoy work­ing along­side oth­er high achievers.
2. Make an imme­di­ate impact: New employ­ees can expect to be giv­en real respon­si­bil­i­ty for the growth of the com­pa­ny. You are empow­ered to per­form as soon as you join the team!
3. Gain well-round­ed expe­ri­ence: CAPLINQ offers a diverse and dynam­ic envi­ron­ment where you will get the chance to work direct­ly with exec­u­tives and devel­op exper­tise across mul­ti­ple areas of the business.

There is no need to send your CV unless it looks awe­some and you want to impress us with how it looks. Oth­er­wise, we will use your LinkedIn pro­file (bet­ter make sure it is complete!). 

Instead, can­di­dates wish­ing to apply are request­ed to send an email to hr@caplinq.com that includes:

• A link to your LinkedIn pro­file (not a CV)

• A one-page, per­son­al cov­er letter

Let me repeat that last part in a dif­fer­ent way… We are look­ing for peo­ple who stand out from the crowd with a well-writ­ten, enthu­si­as­tic one-page let­ter telling us why this posi­tion speaks to you and what you could bring to the team. 

If all you do is send a CV (we told you not to), and no cov­er let­ter your appli­ca­tion will be dis­card­ed with­out even being read.