Senior Consultant - VAVE Program

Senior Consultant – VAVE Program

Location: Cottage Grove, MN (Each location to be visited once. USA (CA, NE, ND, NC, OH) and Tijuana (Mexico). May add few more locations-Client will pay for travel)

Onsite with Hybrid Contract and fulltime Salary-$135k with benefits.

Role Summary:

• The Senior VAVE Consultant will lead, anchor, and execute the end‐to‐end VAVE program directly at the supplier's facility for Industrial products.
• This role ensures that the supplier generates credible, feasible, and implementable cost‐reduction ideas without compromising quality, reliability, performance, or regulatory compliance.
• Consultant will work closely with the Program Manager, the client's cross-functional teams, and the supplier's cross‐functional teams to ensure the program delivers validated savings.

Key Responsibilities

VAVE Strategy, Planning & Alignment

• Translate client expectations, product scope, and savings targets into a structured VAVE execution roadmap for the supplier.
• Establish clear governance, cadence, workshop plans, and decision gates for supplier‐side execution.
• Ensure supplier leadership and cross‐functional teams (Design, Manufacturing, Procurement, Quality etc.,) are aligned, resourced, and accountable.
• Define VAVE workstreams: material, design, process, standardization, and specification optimization.

Technical Analysis & Baseline Preparation

• Review supplier's current product cost structure, BOM, routing, manufacturing processes, tooling.
• Perform structured analyses: functional analysis, cost driver mapping, tear‐down insights, benchmarking, alternate material/process feasibility.
• Identify major value levers and prioritize high‐impact VAVE zones.

Facilitation of Workshops & Ideation Sessions

• Lead and facilitate on‐site VAVE workshops using industry‐standard methods (FAST, DFMA, 7‐step VAVE, idea funneling etc.,).
• Drive supplier participation, ensuring ideas originate from their teams.
• Promote creative but practical ideation, leveraging benchmarks and cross‐industry best practices.
• Maintain a traceable idea register.

Technical & Cost Feasibility Development

• Guide supplier engineers in developing VAVE concepts to a technically defensible level.
• Review supplier calculations: BOM impact, Labor/cycle time changes, Tooling implications, Yield and scrap effects, Supply chain and logistics impacts
• Ensure savings assumptions are realistic, evidence‐backed, and auditable.
• Coordinate supplier's risk assessments (DFMEA/PFMEA updates).

Validation Planning & Coordination

• Work with supplier teams to define prototype, test, and qualification needs for each shortlisted idea.
• Coordinate trials, PPAP/FAI readiness, and supplier internal testing.
• Ensure ideas meet client's quality, regulatory, safety, and performance standards.

Reporting, Documentation & Stakeholder Management

• Maintain up‐to‐date documentation—idea funnel, business cases, risks, decisions, and validation progress.
• Provide weekly progress reports to the Program Manager with clear risks, dependencies, and decisions needed.
• Present VAVE outputs to client engineering, procurement, and leadership stakeholders.
• Drive alignment between supplier and client during reviews.

Implementation Readiness & Handover

• Ensure ideas approved by client are ready for implementation (complete drawings, process updates, validation evidence).
• Support supplier to prepare implementation timelines, investment requests, and transition plans.
• Ensure a clean handover into implementation tracking.

Diverse Lynx LLC is an Equal Employment Opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive due consideration for employment without any discrimination. All applicants will be evaluated solely on the basis of their ability, competence and their proven capability to perform the functions outlined in the corresponding role. We promote and support a diverse workforce across all levels in the company.