Principal Engineer Industrial

Northrop Grumman Northrop Grumman · Aerospace · Rolling Meadows, IL +1 · Material/Process

Principal Industrial Engineer to drive continuous improvement (CI) efforts in manufacturing processes using lean principles and structured problem-solving techniques. Responsibilities include leading cross-functional projects, managing databases for insights, facilitating root cause analyses and kaizen events, performing forecasting and simulation modeling, and serving as a Six Sigma subject matter expert. Requires a Bachelor's degree in Industrial Engineering or related field, 5+ years of experience, Six Sigma certification, and the ability to obtain a Top Secret/SCI clearance.

What you'd actually do

  1. Lead cross functional improvement projects from concept to closure and sustainment
  2. Collaborate with site leadership and teams to ensure alignment with sector initiatives
  3. Manage and analyze databases to drive insights and CI activities (standard work, 5S, storage optimization, and root cause analysis) to reduce waste and improve labor efficiency
  4. Facilitate root cause analyses, value stream mapping, kaizen events, and other structured improvement activities to achieve results
  5. Perform forecasting, simulation modeling, and bottleneck analyses specifically in ramping production lines to optimize product flow and critical paths through the factory

Skills

Required

  • Bachelor's degree in Industrial Engineering, Manufacturing Engineering, or related engineering field
  • Minimum of 5 years of relevant work experience in manufacturing/production, continuous improvement, or industrial engineering roles
  • Six Sigma certification or equivalent continuous improvement certification
  • Experience in Root Cause Corrective Action/Problem Solving with quantifiable improvement results
  • The ability to obtain and maintain a Top Secret/SCI clearance
  • U.S. Citizenship required

Nice to have

  • Six Sigma Black Belt certification or equivalent continuous improvement certification
  • Experience with Microsoft Excel (Formulas: VLOOKUP, INDEXMATCH, IF statements, pivot tables, pivot charts etc.)
  • Experience using simulation software for forecasting and capacity modeling
  • Experience with Minitab Statistical Software

What the JD emphasized

  • Top Secret/SCI clearance
  • U.S. Citizenship required