Job Description

Interim Chief Engineer – Trent XWB

Full Time

Derby/ Hybrid (3 days per week on site)

An exciting opportunity is available for an Interim Chief Engineer – Trent XWB to join the ET&S Civil Team in Derby for an initial 6-month period.

As Chief Engineer – Trent XWB fleet, you will be the formal Design Authority for a critical portfolio of Trent XWB in-service products, overseeing technical excellence, innovation and safety. Reporting to the Director – ET&S Civil, this is an opportunity to drive real impact – shaping strategy, leading an organisation of skilled engineers, and delivering mature product solutions to our customers.

You will work closely with senior stakeholders, regulators and customers, ensuring our products are safe, future-ready, and delivered on time and to budget. This is more than a technical role – it is a role to lead transformation and drive engineering performance.

What you will be doing:

As Chief Engineer, you will:

• Lead as the formal Design Authority for Trent XWB Fleet, accountable for Product Safety, chairing the Product Safety Review Board, and ensuring full compliance with Product Safety and HSE policies.
• Inspire and manage a high-performing engineering team, aligning capability and resources to deliver technical excellence, while setting clear performance goals and maintaining a structure that supports delivery and development.
• Act as the key technical interface with internal and external customers, translating complex stakeholder requirements into clear engineering priorities that feed into divisional and group-level strategies.
• Drive the successful delivery of engineering programs, ensuring on-time, on-budget, first-time-right outputs while proactively managing technical risks and integrating plans into master schedules.
• Champion innovation and continuous improvement, promoting the adoption of new tools and methods to enhance delivery, improve efficiency and ensure compliance with standards in safety, cybersecurity, and IP.

Preferred qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in engineering and 8+ years of experience, or master’s degree in engineering and 6+ years of experience

Preferred requirements:

A successful Chief Engineer will be a professional, safety-focussed engineering leader with a proven track-record of robust technical leadership and engaging people management in high-performing teams. The role requires that you are open-minded and enthusiastic about change, will positively embrace challenge and are able to effectively collaborate across business boundaries; you will consistently demonstrate resilience in an ambiguous, in-service product focussed environment and will successfully lead by example:

• Up to date, relevant, engineering expertise
• Self-starter with an ability to deal with ambiguity
• Demonstrable engineering leadership of successfully delivered projects/tasks to time, cost, quality.
• Experience of collaboration with diverse teams from different cultures
• Knowledge of customer and external relations and/or experience of working in a partnership would be beneficial

Why join Rolls-Royce?

At Rolls-Royce we are proud to be a business that has truly helped to shape the modern world and are committed to always being a force for progress; powering, protecting and connecting people everywhere.

By joining Rolls-Royce, you'll have the opportunity to work on world-class solutions, supported by a culture that believes individuality is our greatest strength, and all perspectives, experiences and backgrounds help us innovate and enable our high-performance culture.

Regional benefits:

• Generous Annual Leave
• Retirement Savings through the Rolls-Royce Retirement Savings Trust
• Group Life Assurance provides for a lump sum benefit if you die whilst employed by Rolls-Royce
• Group Income Protection provides an income in the event that you are unable to work due to illness or injury
• Your Shares: Matched is a simple way to own Rolls-Royce shares and invest in our future, together. Buy one share, get one free!

Our vision is to ensure that the excellence and ingenuity that shaped our history continues into our future. Our multi-year transformation programme aims to turn Rolls-Royce into a high-performing, competitive, resilient and growing company. Join us, and it can be your future vision too.

Rolls-Royce are committed to being a respectful, inclusive, and non-discriminatory workplace where individuality is valued, diverse perspectives fuel innovation, and everyone can thrive.

Please be aware that the priority will be given to employees identified as being at high risk. The professional level and salary of the position will be dependent on the skills and experience of the successful candidate but is anticipated to be Level A.

This job is advertised at the grades shown, and this is the desired operating level for this role. We encourage applications from candidates with relevant experience from any grade.

It is advised that you inform your current manager of your application for this role.

Closing date: 5th June 2026

Job Category

Group Engineering (Chief Engineer)

Posting Date

22 May 2026; 00:05

Posting End Date

05 Jun 2026