Regional Managing Director — Mission-Systems Portfolio

The mandate

This mission-systems portfolio delivers sensing, communications and command capabilities into long-lived defence platforms. Customer demand is increasing while the supply base is becoming less predictable. Specialist electronics face obsolescence and allocation, small suppliers hold irreplaceable process knowledge, and programmes require secure collaboration across classified and allied environments. Existing sourcing was optimised programme by programme, leaving hidden concentration and inconsistent control of sensitive technical information.

The group is creating a Regional Managing Director role to own the North American portfolio and its supply-chain redesign. The executive will carry profit and loss, programme delivery, customer commitments, industrial strategy, supplier performance and workforce. Engineering, security, trade compliance and quality retain their independent authorities. The Managing Director must connect them around executable production and sustainment outcomes.

This planned new role is not a mandate to move every component onshore or build inventory without discrimination. The board expects a risk-based industrial model that identifies which capabilities require sovereign or trusted control, where allied partners improve resilience, and when redesign is more responsible than continuing to buy scarce legacy parts.

Scope and operating context

Based onsite in Washington, DC, the role influences approximately 2,150 employees and material partners across the United States and a wider international region. The perimeter includes business units, programmes, operations, supply chain, customer delivery, industrial partnerships and the interfaces into engineering, finance, contracts, security, quality and government relations.

Programmes span development, low-rate production, full-rate output and decades of sustainment. Supplier suitability changes by phase. A small specialist may be ideal during design but unable to meet production assurance; a larger vendor may provide capacity but lack the process or security required for classified work. Customer approval can be necessary before a source, component or manufacturing location changes.

Information flow is as important as material. Drawings, software, test data and threat-sensitive requirements may be compartmented by programme, nationality or role. Suppliers need enough information to deliver without receiving access beyond need. Slow or ambiguous access decisions can create schedule failure, while uncontrolled sharing creates unacceptable security and export risk.

First-year agenda

The first one hundred days will create a portfolio industrial-risk baseline. The Managing Director will connect bills of material, obsolescence, lead time, sole sources, capacity, quality, cyber posture, clearance, country, export classification, tooling, inventory and programme milestones. The review will focus on mission-critical paths and distinguish data confidence from apparent completeness.

Supplier segmentation will reflect consequence and substitutability. Strategic sources may hold unique technology or trusted capacity and require joint plans. Critical constrained suppliers need capacity, quality, cyber and financial interventions. Competitive categories can use standard sourcing discipline. Each segment will have an accountable executive, evidence requirement and exit or continuity approach.

Component obsolescence will move from reactive purchase to engineering and commercial choice. Programmes will compare lifetime buy, redesign, emulation, alternate qualification and customer-supported architecture change. Decisions will include security, verification, certification, inventory holding and sustainment horizon. Scarcity premiums will not be paid indefinitely without a forward path.

A secure collaboration model will define how suppliers receive requirements, exchange data, resolve defects and support configuration. Access will follow classification, export, citizenship and programme rules. Common infrastructure may be appropriate for reusable unclassified work, while compartmented environments remain where necessary. The executive will challenge both uncontrolled convenience and security processes that block authorised delivery without timely resolution.

Capacity interventions will use real process evidence. The team will identify constrained equipment, skilled labour, test, material, clearance and approval, then decide whether funding, long-term commitment, dual source, tooling transfer or redesign creates value. Supplier promises will be tested through rate-readiness reviews and actual yield, not accepted as aggregate factory capacity.

Allied industrial partnerships will be assessed programme by programme. They can provide resilient capacity, customer legitimacy and local sustainment, but introduce rights, export, security and configuration complexity. Workshare will be placed where capability and lifecycle value justify it, with clear technical authority and acceptance.

Quality escape and counterfeit risk will receive focused action. Traceability, authorised distribution, incoming evidence, test and anomaly escalation will be strengthened for high-risk electronics. Urgent schedule pressure will not permit undocumented brokers or unverified substitutions. Suspect material will be contained and reported through required channels.

The Managing Director will also address supplier financial and workforce fragility. Small firms can become critical through one process or expert. Interventions may include milestone restructuring, advance material, technical assistance, acquisition of assets or orderly transfer. Assistance will have conditions and governance; customer funds and competition obligations must be respected.

By year-end, priority programmes should have fewer unowned industrial risks, credible obsolescence paths and improved rate confidence. The region should also demonstrate secure supplier collaboration that accelerates authorised work without expanding access indiscriminately.

Leadership responsibilities

The Regional Managing Director will lead the portfolio executive team and report to the group board and Group Chief Executive. They will own one view of schedule, industrial risk, cost and customer consequence. Programme optimism and functional risk must be reconciled before commitments reach government customers.

They will maintain senior relationships with acquisition leaders, allied customers, prime contractors and strategic suppliers. The executive must communicate a constraint early, present alternatives and keep commitments once agreed. Lobbying or relationship pressure will never substitute for technical, security and contractual evidence.

Internally, the role will build leaders who can work across programme, engineering and industrial boundaries. Supplier development, security and quality teams require authority and career depth. Repeated escalation caused by unclear ownership will lead to operating-model change.

Measures of success

The board will track milestone and delivery performance, rate readiness, critical-material coverage, obsolescence exposure, sole-source risk, supplier yield, quality escapes and cost-to-complete. It will distinguish purchased inventory from risk actually retired.

Security and compliance measures include authorised access lead time, supplier cyber posture, export exceptions, configuration integrity and reportable events. Industrial outcomes cover alternate qualification, allied capacity, small-supplier stability and tested recovery. Customer confidence and programme cash will also be reviewed.

Candidate profile

Candidates should bring more than 28 years in aerospace, defence, mission electronics or another highly regulated complex-product environment. They must have run a large programme or regional P&L and redesigned a secure international supply chain. Experience with long-life electronics and government customers is essential.

The board will seek examples of choosing redesign over lifetime buy, intervening in a fragile specialist supplier and creating allied workshare without losing configuration or security control. Candidates should understand programme contracts, export controls, classified environments, quality, obsolescence, production and sustainment.

The successful leader will be decisive and evidence-led. They must respect independent security and quality authority, challenge false programme certainty and maintain credibility with engineers, suppliers, customers and boards under schedule pressure.

Compensation and appointment terms

The annual base range is USD 500,000–750,000, supplemented by annual incentive and long-term participation. Reward will balance programme delivery, industrial resilience, compliance, cash and leadership depth. Final terms will reflect comparable mission-systems scale and verified forfeited awards.

Confidentiality

The group remains unnamed because programme, customer, supplier and industrial-capability information is sensitive and may be controlled. Detailed material will be limited by identity, conflict, nationality, authorisation and confidentiality requirements. Applicants must not submit classified, export-controlled or proprietary programme information.