Interim Project Manager

Client: Robert Bürkle GmbH, Industry: Special Machine Engineering, Company size: approx. €73 M revenue (2020), about 700 employees. Area: Electrical Design and Development, Hardware and Software.

Managed the Design and Development department as a vacancy bridge.

The previous manager resigned. A successor was urgently needed. To bridge the gap, they sought a young interim manager to oversee the team and ongoing projects, support the search for new staff and a permanent manager, and then hand over the team and projects to the new leader.

Challenges:

• Disciplinary and technical leadership of the department until a permanent successor is hired.
• Staff management (8 employees): team meetings, one-on-ones, performance reviews.
• Recruiting new employees. Lowering the average team age. Goal: at least 4 new hires, ideally very young.
• Capacity planning.
• External perspective to identify optimization potential.
• Improving communication with other departments and headquarters.
• Collaboration with colleges and universities.
• Further development of existing processes and implementation of modern tools.
• Introduction of MES (Manufacturing Execution System).
• Support and project management of various internal development projects, such as “Digital Twin”.

Achievements:

• Introduced the version control tool “Octoplant”.
• Started team meetings every two weeks and one-on-ones every month.
• Created and rolled out a virtual machine for multiple TIA Portal versions (v13 to v18) and various developer tools company-wide.
• External analysis and submission of numerous improvement proposals to division management, including timeline, added value, customer benefit, and cost analysis.
• Established and maintained contacts with universities and hired a working student.

Client: International medium-sized EMS company, Industry: Electronics Manufacturing Services, Company size: approx. €200 M revenue worldwide (2021) and about 3000 employees. Area: Product and Test Development/Test Field/Test Maintenance.

Headed development, led a transfer project, expanded the department, and supported the search for a successor.

The previous head of development resigned. A successor was urgently needed. To bridge the gap, they sought a young interim manager to oversee the team and projects, assist in finding a permanent head, and then hand everything over.

Challenges:

• Disciplinary and technical leadership of the entire development department, 14 employees.
• Expanding the department by hiring new staff.
• Coaching and training all employees.
• Capacity planning and prioritization of bottlenecks.
• Support for the transfer project and communication with the client.

Achievements:

• Hired two new employees.
• Restructured the development department into four areas: Product Development, Test Development, Test Field, Test Maintenance.
• Introduced and mentored a team leader in the test field.
• Supported the transfer project from development and test field perspectives.

Family business, Industry: Online Retail. Area: Management.

Built an online shop for electronics accessories.

My wife wanted to do more than be a homemaker and set up a family business on the side. The idea for an online shop came from my hobby.

Company management, strategic purchasing, customer communication, accounting, online, Amazon and eBay shop maintenance. Sold various new goods mainly on eBay and Amazon, partly via our own website; product range (constantly growing): consumer PC accessories, consumer electronics, mobile phone batteries, and more.

Achievements:

• Established sales on eBay, Amazon, eBay Classifieds, and our own shop.
• Developed our online shop based on WordPress and WooCommerce.

Industry: Automation, Digitalization, and Electronics Services, Company size: about 1000 employees. Area: Electronics and Embedded Software Development. Topic: Evaluation of the use of embedded Linux in an industrial environment and driver programming on a test system.