Caplinq technical service manager

Technical Service Manager ROCKSTAR

Web­site caplinq CAPLINQ Cor­po­ra­tion

Spe­cial­ty Chem­i­cals, Adhe­sives, & Plastics

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 Busi­ness Devel­op­ment Direc­tor, this posi­tion will require that you work close­ly with ven­dors, cus­tomers, and a tech­ni­cal staff of appli­ca­tions engineers.

ROLE’S MISSION

The prod­uct and appli­ca­tions engi­neer sup­ports new tech­ni­cal sales oppor­tu­ni­ties that increase CAPLINQ’s sales rev­enue of prod­ucts sup­plied by our suppliers.

DESIRED OUTCOMES

  • Cre­ate & main­tain a tech­ni­cal train­ing library for mate­ri­als-relat­ed prod­ucts and ser­vices to train and devel­op new hires, tech­ni­cal staff, sales, and customers.
  • Cen­tral­ize tech­ni­cal infor­ma­tion from sup­pli­ers and ven­dors to facil­i­tate effec­tive use and dissemination.
  • Train and man­age Appli­ca­tions Engi­neers to use tech­ni­cal infor­ma­tion and train­ing mate­r­i­al to sup­port the sales team in pro­vid­ing tech­ni­cal solu­tions to customers.

CANDIDATE COMPETENCIES | Can­di­date can/has/is:

  • Devel­op tech­ni­cal exper­tise in all the appli­ca­tions and prod­uct cat­e­gories offered by the sales team.
  • Skilled at ana­lyz­ing tech­ni­cal infor­ma­tion to iden­ti­fy trends, pat­terns, and areas for improve­ment in order to con­tin­u­ous­ly improve the tech­ni­cal ser­vice function.
  • Atten­tion to detail; ensure tech­ni­cal infor­ma­tion is accu­rate­ly con­sol­i­dat­ed, man­aged, & disseminated.
  • Strong com­mu­ni­ca­tion skills to effec­tive­ly train and man­age Appli­ca­tions Engi­neers, as well as to com­mu­ni­cate tech­ni­cal infor­ma­tion to inter­nal and exter­nal stakeholders.
  • Effec­tive lead­er­ship skills to guide tech­ni­cal ser­vice teams, set & man­age OKRs and man­age projects
  • Com­pile tech­ni­cal train­ing doc­u­ments and train sales & mar­ket­ing on our products

THE ROLE
Yes, you read that right – we’re look­ing for a SUPERSTAR. We’re seek­ing an orga­nized and tech­ni­cal­ly skilled indi­vid­ual that can both cre­ate and main­tain a tech­ni­cal library as well as train and man­age a team of Appli­ca­tions Engi­neers. We wel­come both expe­ri­enced tech­ni­cal man­agers as well as tech­ni­cal indi­vid­u­als who have not yet led a team to apply. The com­pen­sa­tion pack­age will be com­men­su­rate with the appli­can­t’s expe­ri­ence and skill set.

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 oth­ers to pro­vide this type of support.

You will col­lab­o­rate close­ly with the sales team to rec­om­mend new prod­ucts and appli­ca­tion meth­ods as well as to com­pre­hend the tech­ni­cal dif­fi­cul­ties that our cus­tomers encounter while using our prod­ucts. You will also work close­ly with our mar­ket­ing team to under­stand the prod­ucts we make and offer and they will work with you to pub­lish much of that tech­ni­cal infor­ma­tion online. You will also be respon­si­ble for man­ag­ing a team of appli­ca­tion engi­neers who will field a diverse range of activ­i­ties and requests relat­ed to cus­tomer sup­port, ser­vice, and coor­di­na­tion of leads and projects.

Your suc­cess in this posi­tion will hinge on your pas­sion for immers­ing your­self in the tech­ni­cal details of our prod­ucts and assist­ing your team to sup­port sales and cus­tomers in select­ing and uti­liz­ing the appro­pri­ate prod­ucts for their appli­ca­tions. If you are some­one who prefers to focus on the tech­ni­cal rather than the com­mer­cial side of appli­ca­tions, this may be the ide­al posi­tion for you.

As a fast-grow­ing multi­na­tion­al, our prod­ucts and ser­vices cater to a vari­ety of indus­tries, includ­ing auto­mo­tive, fuel cell, semi­con­duc­tor, 5G, hydro­gen- & eMo­bil­i­ty, and we are seek­ing a Tech­ni­cal Ser­vice Man­ag­er to pro­vide the required tech­ni­cal sup­port to dri­ve sales. We are search­ing for a proac­tive, super-orga­nized, enthu­si­as­tic mul­ti­tasker who enjoys col­lab­o­rat­ing with engi­neers on tech­nolo­gies that will shape the future.

If you are inter­est­ed in this posi­tion, please read on. How­ev­er, if you find this job post to be exhaust­ing, we rec­om­mend tak­ing a nap and explor­ing oth­er job opportunities.

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. No two days will like­ly be the same.

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

1. Cre­at­ing and main­tain­ing tech­ni­cal doc­u­ments of prod­uct infor­ma­tion (about 40% of your time)

You will receive tech­ni­cal infor­ma­tion from every­where; cus­tomers, ven­dors, and your own tech­ni­cal team. You and your team will be respon­si­ble for under­stand­ing what it is, and trans­lat­ing it into a for­mat that will help sales sup­port cus­tomers’ applications.

Exam­ples of activities:

  • Col­lect­ing and inter­pret­ing test results on our prod­ucts from sales, cus­tomers & vendors
  • Inter­act­ing with sup­pli­ers and cus­tomers to get and give the lat­est data and test results
  • Design­ing, con­duct­ing, and lead­ing exper­i­ments to gen­er­ate cus­tomer-rel­e­vant data
  • Cre­at­ing TDS, Prod­uct Selec­tor guides & Pre­sen­ta­tions to show­case exist­ing and roadmap products
  • Answer­ing cus­tomer tech­ni­cal inquiries about our products

2. Train­ing and man­ag­ing a team of Appli­ca­tions Engi­neers (about 40% of your time)

You will man­age a team of appli­ca­tion engi­neers that will be respon­si­ble for pro­vid­ing tech­ni­cal sup­port to our cus­tomers. You will be respon­si­ble for them col­lect­ing and using all the infor­ma­tion you have cre­at­ed as well as man­ag­ing them in a way that sup­ports your objectives. 

Exam­ples of activities:

  • Set Objec­tives & Key Results (OKRs) for the appli­ca­tions engineers
  • Teach and train the appli­ca­tions engi­neers on all the company’s prod­ucts and applications
  • Teach, train, and lead by exam­ple to teach the engi­neers how to sup­port cus­tomers’ projects
  • Devel­op and con­duct week­ly tech­ni­cal train­ing ses­sions with engi­neers, sales staff, and new hires
  • Devel­op the appli­ca­tions engi­neers also to be able to cre­ate and lead tech­ni­cal sessions

3. Cen­tral­ize and dis­sem­i­nate a tech­ni­cal library (about 20% of your time)

We want to use all this valu­able tech­ni­cal infor­ma­tion being cre­at­ed. The best way is to cen­tral­ize and orga­nize it in a way that new hires, tech­ni­cal staff, sales, engi­neers, and cus­tomers know where to find it and how to use it.

Exam­ples of activities:

  • Cre­ate a library of tech­ni­cal documentation
  • Devel­op a sys­tem to onboard new tech­ni­cal hires and sales engi­neers to learn the tech­ni­cal material
  • Reg­u­lar­ly teach sales engi­neers and oth­er col­leagues where to find spe­cif­ic tech­ni­cal information

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 we 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. Expe­ri­enced Man­ag­er – You do not need to have years of expe­ri­ence man­ag­ing peo­ple. Many of us were first-time man­agers and learned through our sys­tem how to become great managers.

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 Bach­e­lor of Science
    • 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 a strong plan­ner and orga­niz­er and thrives in get­ting things done 
    • 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 8/10)
    • 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. Project man­age­ment expe­ri­ence: You will need to man­age mul­ti­ple projects simul­ta­ne­ous­ly. This means report­ing inter­nal­ly as well as exter­nal­ly to both cus­tomers and sup­pli­ers. Strong project man­age­ment skills will help you enormously.
  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.
  4. A work hard, play hard men­tal­i­ty: CAPLINQ places high val­ue on work hard and play hard. We have beer o’clock on Fri­days, a sum­mer BBQ, Christ­mas din­ner, and Social Com­mit­tee events to cel­e­brate the hard work eth­ic the team has for the company.

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.

About Chris Perabo

Chris is an energetic and enthusiastic engineer and entrepreneur. He is always interested in taking highly technical subjects and distilling these to their essence so that even the layman can understand. He loves to get into the technical details of an issue and then understand how it can be useful for specific customers and applications. Chris is currently the Director of Business Development at CAPLINQ.