Customer Programs Manager
Location: Chattanooga, Tennessee
Department: Customer Programs
Reports To: Director of Customer Programs
Employment Type: Full-Time

Position Summary
System One is seeking an experienced, customer-focused Customer Programs Manager to serve as the primary internal coordinator and customer-facing point of contact for assigned strategic customer programs.
This role owns the day-to-day execution rhythm for assigned programs from order intake and contract handoff through manufacturing, inspection, shipment, delivery, and follow-on opportunities. The Customer Programs Manager works closely with Engineering, Quality, Manufacturing, Supply Chain, Planning, Finance, and Sales to ensure customer requirements are clearly understood, commitments are executable, risks are identified early, and customer communication is proactive, accurate, and consistent.
The ideal candidate has a background in complex manufacturing, nuclear, industrial services, engineered products, power generation, or similarly regulated environments. This is not a traditional project coordinator role. The Customer Programs Manager must be able to lead cross-functional discussions, hold internal teams accountable to commitments, communicate effectively with customers, and bring structure to complex programs where schedule, technical scope, quality requirements, and commercial considerations must remain aligned.
Core Responsibilities
Customer Program Ownership
Serve as the day-to-day owner and primary point of contact for assigned strategic customer programs.
Establish trusted relationships with customer stakeholders while ensuring internal alignment before commitments are made.
Lead program kickoff, contract handoff, milestone, status, risk, and closeout discussions for assigned customer programs.
Ensure customer requirements, commitments, delivery expectations, documentation requirements, and scope changes are captured, understood, and communicated internally.
Provide customers with timely, factual, well-coordinated updates on schedule, production status, technical matters, risks, recovery actions, and deliverables.
Escalate material customer concerns, scope changes, schedule risks, quality issues, and commercial matters promptly through the appropriate Master Machine leadership channels.
Support customer visits, source inspections, witness and hold points, program reviews, and post-delivery follow-up as needed.
Cross-Functional Program Execution
Coordinate assigned customer programs across Engineering, Quality, Manufacturing, Supply Chain, Planning, Finance, and Sales.
Translate contractual and customer requirements into clear internal actions, deliverables, owners, due dates, and decision points.
Lead recurring internal program reviews to confirm schedule status, production readiness, material availability, engineering progress, quality requirements, customer deliverables, and open risks.
Maintain clear visibility to critical-path activities, milestones, dependencies, constraints, and recovery actions.
Partner with Manufacturing and Planning to ensure customer commitments are realistic, capacity-aware, and supported by an executable production plan.
Partner with Engineering to ensure technical questions, design inputs, deviations, and changes are resolved in a timely and controlled manner.
Partner with Quality to ensure inspection requirements, documentation packages, source surveillance, nonconformances, corrective actions, and customer quality expectations are managed appropriately.
Partner with Supply Chain to address material availability, vendor performance, long-lead items, and supply-related schedule risk.
Partner with Finance and Sales to support billing milestones, cash collection, change management, margin protection, and commercial communications.
Program Controls and Risk Management
Develop and maintain program schedules, milestone trackers, action-item logs, risk registers, customer communication logs, and other program-control tools for assigned accounts.
Identify emerging technical, quality, manufacturing, supply-chain, schedule, and commercial risks before they become customer-impacting issues.
Drive timely assignment, ownership, escalation, and closure of program actions.
Support preparation of customer-facing status reports, executive summaries, schedule updates, dashboards, and recovery plans.
Maintain disciplined records of commitments, decisions, changes, meeting actions, and customer correspondence.
Help establish and continuously improve common tools, templates, meeting rhythms, scorecards, and best practices for the Customer Programs function.
Customer Growth and Internal Alignment
Support Sales and Business Development by identifying customer needs, follow-on opportunities, recurring service requirements, and lessons learned from active programs.
Ensure a disciplined transition from Sales and Business Development into execution and from program completion into follow-on business development.
Protect customer trust by ensuring internal teams communicate one coordinated, fact-based message.
Help reinforce a customer-first culture grounded in quality, safety, commercial discipline, and realistic execution commitments.
Required Qualifications
Bachelor’s degree in Engineering, Business, Operations, Supply Chain, Project Management, or a related field preferred. Equivalent relevant experience will be considered.
Five or more years of experience in program management, project management, customer program management, account management, operations leadership, engineering leadership, manufacturing, or a related customer-facing execution role.
Experience managing complex, cross-functional programs involving engineering, manufacturing, quality, procurement, and customer stakeholders.
Demonstrated ability to manage customer expectations, communicate difficult information clearly, and maintain trust during schedule, technical, quality, or commercial challenges.
Strong working knowledge of project controls, schedules, milestone management, risk management, action tracking, and status reporting.
Strong organizational discipline and demonstrated attention to detail, follow-through, documentation, and closure.
Ability to influence cross-functional teams without relying solely on direct reporting authority.
Excellent written, verbal, presentation, and customer communication skills.
Proficiency with Microsoft Office, including Excel, PowerPoint, Word, and Outlook.
Preferred Qualifications
Experience in the nuclear industry, nuclear manufacturing, nuclear services, power generation, advanced reactors, DOE/NNSA programs, or another highly regulated industrial environment.
Familiarity with NQA-1 quality requirements, ASME Section III, commercial-grade dedication, 10 CFR 50 Appendix B, or equivalent quality and compliance frameworks.
Experience in a build-to-print, engineered-to-order, machining, fabrication, pressure-boundary, packaging, or complex industrial manufacturing environment.
PMP certification, program-management certification, engineering degree, or equivalent technical or project leadership credentials.
Experience using ERP, MRP, project management, scheduling, CRM, or manufacturing planning systems.
Experience supporting contract execution, change orders, claims, pricing inputs, billing milestones, margin management, and cash collection.
What Success Looks Like
First 90 Days
Builds productive relationships with assigned customers and Master Machine’s core functional leaders.
Establishes a clear understanding of assigned program scope, contractual commitments, schedules, quality requirements, risks, and immediate priorities.
Implements a reliable program cadence for internal reviews and customer communication.
Creates or improves visibility to active program milestones, action items, decision needs, and risks.
Identifies key execution, schedule, quality, supply-chain, and commercial risks requiring leadership attention.
First 12 Months
Improves consistency and quality of communication with assigned strategic customers.
Increases internal visibility and accountability for program commitments, milestones, risks, and recovery actions.
Helps reduce avoidable surprises, late escalations, missed handoffs, and unclear ownership.
Supports on-time delivery, customer satisfaction, quality performance, cash collection, and margin protection for assigned programs.
Contributes to a repeatable customer-programs operating model that can scale as Master Machine grows.
Key Competencies
Customer ownership and relationship management
Program execution and schedule discipline
Cross-functional leadership and influence
Manufacturing and engineering coordination
Quality and documentation discipline
Risk identification and escalation
Clear, concise, fact-based communication
Problem solving and sound judgment under pressure
Action tracking, follow-through, and closure
Commercial awareness and accountability
Continuous-improvement mindset
Position Distinction
The Customer Programs Manager personally owns the day-to-day execution, communication, controls, and cross-functional coordination of assigned customer programs.
The Director of Customer Programs owns the function itself, including organizational build-out, leadership of Customer Programs Managers, common systems and governance, strategic customer relationships, escalation leadership, capacity planning, and the broader operating model.
For Master Machine’s immediate need, this position will provide near-term customer-program management capability while serving as a foundational role in the future Customer Programs organization.