Continuous Improvement Engineer

Your Job

Guardian Industries is looking for a Continuous Improvement Engineer to join our team in Carleton, MI!

The Continuous Improvement Engineer will partner with operations, quality, and support functions to identify and eliminate waste, improve process performance, and drive sustainable, profitable improvements.

This role uses data driven, economic thinking to prioritize opportunities, applies risk-based process control to ensure quality consistency, and develops a culture and toolbox for rigorous root cause analysis and countermeasure implementation.

The successful candidate builds systemic knowledge of our process controls and acts as a technical and cultural change agent.

Our Team

You will be part of a diverse contribution motivated team, working within a culture that encourages entrepreneurship and challenge with respect and humility to deliver superior results for our internal and external customers.

What You Will Do


* Implement and maintain a risk-based approach to process control (FMEA, control plans, critical-to-quality identification)


* Design and operationalize statistical process control (SPC) and capability studies to monitor process stability and capability


* Drive understanding of quality control effectiveness by linking control data to business outcomes (scrap, rework, customer complaints, warranty)


* Recommend and implement control strategies (automation, poka-yoke, process 3) Root Cause Analysis & Systemic Process Knowledge


* Build systemic knowledge of process control systems to enable rapid problem solving


* Equip teams with RCA tools (5 Whys, fishbone/Ishikawa, fault tree) and guide structured investigations to identify true root causes


* Ensure robust countermeasure design, verification, and follow-up (PDCA/DMAIC), and prevent recurrence with documented controls


* Foster a culture of accountability and learning, ensure lessons learned are captured and spread across sites


* Lead cross-functional Kaizen events and continuous improvement workshops


* Train and mentor staff in Lean, Six Sigma, and problem-solving methods


* Collaborate with IT and analytics teams to scale data collection, automation, and reporting


* Support change management and stakeholder communication for rollouts

Who You Are (Basic Qualifications)


* Continuous improvement, process engineering, or quality engineering experience in manufacturing/operations or relevant environment


* Demonstrated experience with Lean, Six Sigma (Yellow/Green Belt or equivalent), RCA, and/or SPC


* Strong analytical skills using Excel, Minitab, Python/R, or similar application in addition to comfort with data-driven decision-making/influencing without authority


* Experience leading projects and communicating with stakeholders and cross functional teams

What Will Put You Ahead


* Bachelor's degree in Engineering, Industrial Engineering, Operations Management, or related field


* Six ...