Job DescriptionChief EngineerRoanoke Rapids, NC | Technical Leadership • Reliability • People DevelopmentHalifax Linen Service is seeking a Chief Engineer to own the reliability, technical capability, and life cycle performance of our equipment, facilities, utilities, and technical infrastructure. This is not simply a senior maintenance technician position. We are seeking a hands-on technical leader who can build a disciplined maintenance organization, develop people, improve reliability, strengthen maintenance systems, exercise sound engineering judgment, and protect Halifax's capital investment.
What You Will Own- Equipment reliability and structured diagnosis of significant and recurring failures.
- Leadership, accountability, and technical development of the maintenance team.
- Discipline and effectiveness of Halifax's maintenance management system (HAM), including work orders, asset history, PM/PdM, backlog, labor, parts usage, and failure documentation.
- Preventive and predictive maintenance strategy that measurably reduces failures and unplanned downtime.
- Maintenance, reliability, engineering, utilities, facilities technical systems, and technical infrastructure.
- Repair-versus-replace analysis, equipment lifecycle decisions, capital recommendations, installations, and commissioning.
- Technical vendor relationships, engineering resources, critical-spare strategy, and partnership with the Parts Coordinator on purchasing and inventory execution.
- Safe maintenance practices and technical compliance, including electrical safety, Lockout/Tagout, machine guarding, hot work, boilers/pressure vessels, and related inspections.
- Cross-functional partnership with Operations and Production while maintaining clear engineering and reliability ownership.
What We Are Looking For- 5-7 years of industrial mechanical/electrical maintenance, engineering, or closely related experience.
- Progressive maintenance leadership responsibility, including direct leadership and development of technical employees.
- Strong mechanical and electrical troubleshooting capability with exposure to PLCs, VFDs, HMIs, sensors, I/O, motor controls, and industrial controls.
- Experience with CMMS/work-order systems and disciplined preventive/predictive maintenance programs.
- Demonstrated use of structured troubleshooting and root-cause failure analysis.
- Experience with major equipment installations, commissioning, vendors, contractors, or capital projects.
- Ability to make difficult technical and business decisions under pressure and communicate clearly with production, maintenance, vendors, and senior leadership.
- Curiosity, learning agility, and the ability to become deeply knowledgeable about unfamiliar equipment and systems.
Preferred ExperienceExperience in a manufacturing or industrial production environment is strongly valued. Commercial laundry, textile, uniform, apparel, or linen experience is valuable but not required. Experience with boilers/steam, industrial utilities, material handling, highly automated production equipment, and multi-site facilities is a plus.
Leadership StructureThe Chief Engineer reports to the Vice President of Operations. The Chief Engineer owns maintenance, reliability, engineering, utilities, and technical infrastructure and works as a peer functional leader with the Plant Manager, who owns production execution and custodial/housekeeping operations.
Benefits- 401(K)
- Dental Insurance
- Major Medical
- Paid time Off (PTO)
- Vision Insurance
- Short Term Disability
