Senior Customer Quality Engineer

About our group:

The Customer Quality Engineering (CQE) team partners with major OEM, Cloud, and Channel customers to deliver a strong total customer experience through qualification readiness, failure analysis leadership, and closed-loop corrective action. We work cross-functionally with Design, Reliability, Factory Engineering, Released Product Teams, worldwide FA labs, and customer technical teams to prevent escapes, resolve escalations, and improve quality operating mechanisms and artifacts so they are repeatable and audit-ready

About the role - you will:

• Own end-to-end customer quality for major accounts across qualification, pilot, and sustaining phases. 
• Lead complex customer escalations with strong emphasis on Failure Analysis (FA) management, corrective action closure (8D), and customer-facing technical communications.

• You will serve in a customer facing CQE role, supporting OEM, Cloud, and channel customers while partnering closely with design, reliability, factory engineering, released product teams, worldwide FA labs, and customer teams to drive an exceptional total customer experience.

• Operate with significant autonomy, drive cross-functional alignment, and strengthen CQE operating rhythm and artifacts (trackers, repositories, lessons learned, readiness documentation) so work products are repeatable, auditable, and resilient to transitions.

• Core Customer CQE Responsibilities:

• • Serve as the CQE lead for assigned major customer account(s), owning quality execution across qualification, pilot, and sustaining phases.
  • Drive qualification readiness and execution (Pilot/RTS), including execution tracking, risk assessment, and crisp status reporting to internal stakeholders and customers.
  • Own customer-facing Failure Analysis (FA) requests end-to-end: prioritize, route, track turnaround time, challenge conclusions as needed, and synthesize findings into clear, data-backed narratives for internal/external audiences.
  • Lead and author customer corrective action responses (8D or customer-required formats), coordinating cross-functional teams through containment, root cause, corrective action verification, and sustained closure.
  • Develop and present customer communication packages that clearly articulate issue description, scope/impact assessment, containment, risk evaluation, and action plans; maintain action trackers and ensure closure discipline.
  • Proactively identify emerging risks from qualification/field signals and drive cross-functional mitigation plans before they become customer escalations

• Data & AI-Enabled CQE Responsibilities:

• Build and maintain analytics pipelines for quality signals (qualification logs, FA outputs, reliability metrics, integration/field data, and customer telemetry) to identify trends, outliers, and emerging risks.
• Create lightweight automation and tools (Python, SQL, dashboards) to reduce manual effort in recurring CQE workflows such as log parsing, data preparation, reporting, and action tracking.
• Apply statistical reasoning to support reliability and quality narratives, including trend analysis, failure‑rate concepts, confidence in conclusions, and appropriate handling of small or incomplete data sets.
• Use Generative AI responsibly to accelerate CQE work products (e.g., drafting technical summaries, synthesizing FA findings, proposing next‑step experiments, generating first‑pass 8D content), while validating outputs against source data and complying with data classification and IP protection rules.

• Standards, Process Rigor, and Best Practices:

• Apply structured problem‑solving methodologies (8D, closed‑loop corrective action discipline, root cause analysis) and support issue tracking through verified closure.
• Develop working knowledge of enterprise storage qualification expectations, endurance and reliability definitions, and how test results translate to customer risk.
• Perform and validate log and telemetry analysis using approved internal tools; ensure supporting evidence is properly captured and linked in tracking systems for cross‑team visibility.
• Demonstrate strong data stewardship, documentation discipline, and audit readiness in all customer-facing quality activities; ensure traceability from conclusions to evidence.
• Drive continuous improvement to CQE processes (FA prioritization, tracker hygiene, readiness documentation, lessons learned) and influence adoption across teams and sites

About you:

• Proven technical owner who thrives in customer-facing situations and can lead ambiguous, high-impact quality escalations to closure.
• Strong written and verbal communicator who can explain complex technical and quality topics clearly to both internal teams and external customers.
• Data‑first mindset: comfortable working with messy, high‑volume datasets and challenging conclusions until evidence supports them.
• Demonstrated ability to influence without authority, align cross-functional teams, and drive closure with disciplined program management.
• Practical and responsible AI user who understands the importance of validation, data governance, and IP protection

Your experience includes:

• Experience supporting enterprise storage products (HDD), including qualification/pilot readiness, integration support, and field escalation management.
• Demonstrated experience in customer quality engineering, reliability/quality engineering, failure analysis, factory/test engineering, or a closely related technical role.
• Demonstrated ability to lead structured problem-solving (8D or equivalent) and drive corrective actions through verified closure
• Strong written and verbal communication skills suitable for customer-facing technical work and cross-functional leadership.
• Bachelor’s degree in engineering related field (i.e. Electrical, Mechanical, Chemical, Computer Engineering, Materials, Physics, or Information Technology) and 5+ years of experience or master’s degree in the same and 3+ years’ experience or PhD and 0+ years’ experience or equivalent experience and education.

You might also have

• Demonstrated ownership of FA request management and synthesis of lab findings into defensible customer narratives.
• Experience with SQL and data visualization tools (Tableau, Power BI) and/or handling large log or telemetry‑style datasets.
• Experience leading customer-facing technical reviews, crafting executive-ready communication packages, and influencing decisions with evidence-based risk framing.
• Working knowledge of reliability metrics and modeling concepts (AFR/FR, confidence bounds, sample-size limitations) and how to communicate them responsibly.
• Experience improving team operating mechanisms (trackers, templates, readiness documentation, lessons learned repositories) to improve audit readiness and transition resilience

Location:

This position can be based out of our Longmont, Colorado or our Shakopee, Minnesota facilities.

Our Longmont product-design campus is nestled against the foothills with exceptional views of the Rocky Mountains. Here at work, you can grab breakfast and lunch in the on-site cafeteria or get an afternoon espresso, prepared by a professional barista. Our 1,500+ employees enjoy an active on-site experience from sporting activities (get in a few laps at lunch on our 1-mile walking path around campus, play ping-pong or volleyball, or stop in our 24- hour fitness center for a group or individual workout) to community service and many employee resource groups including Pride! Women’s Leadership Network and a Young Professionals Network.

Our Shakopee campus is located 25 minutes southwest of Minneapolis in a setting with a rural vibe – it overlooks a horse racing track and stables, yet it has great entertainment venues close by as well. With wide-open spaces, the campus has plenty of space for running, biking, shooting some hoops or playing volleyball over lunch. If working out is your thing, the on-site fully equipped fitness center hosts wellness programs, tournaments and group workouts. Hungry? Seagate offers an on-site café with freshly sourced foods and specialty coffees, or if you prefer, drive to one of many restaurants just minutes away.

The estimated base salary range for this position is $81,536.00 - $116,596.00. The individual salary is based on work location and additional factors, including job-related skills, experience, and relevant education or training.

Seagate offers comprehensive benefits to its eligible employees, including, but not limited to, , eligibility to participate in discretionary bonus program, medical, dental, vision, and life insurance, short-and long-term disability, 401(k), employee stock purchase plan, health savings account, dependent care, and healthcare spending accounts. Seagate also offers paid time off, including 12 holidays, flexible time off provided pursuant to Seagate policy, a minimum of 48 hours of paid sick leave, and 16 weeks of paid parental leave. The benefits for this position are based on a full-time schedule for a full calendar year and may differ depending on work location.

Location: Shakopee, United States
Travel: None