Principal Designer

Summary

Provides design leadership and strategic direction to ensure design work meets the highest standards of quality, client expectations, and industry best practices. Leads complex, high-impact projects while driving cross-functional collaboration and delivering innovative design solutions. Acts as a mentor, thought leader, and subject matter expert—guiding execution, fostering innovation, and promoting consistency across the organization. Participates in special projects as needed.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities

• Provides expert-level design solutions that align with business goals and client needs.
• Act as the primary client liaison for Design in gathering requirements, aligning design solutions, and ensuring satisfaction throughout the project lifecycle.
• Drive cross-functional collaboration with engineering, operations, sales, and other departments to deliver integrated, high-quality solutions.
• Define and validate technical specifications and compliance frameworks for major programs, ensuring design excellence, consistency, and integrity.
• Partner with Sales to provide technical expertise in support of new proposals, client pursuits, and strategic growth opportunities.
• Support client engagement efforts, participating in presentations and technical discussions to represent design expertise and reinforce company credibility.
• Collaborate with Design Director to lead design strategy, planning, and execution for high-profile, complex, or mission-critical projects.
• Support problem solving creative solutions with engineering leaders and project teams, resolving challenges and ensuring design feasibility.
• Champion innovation and efficiency by evolving design processes, tools, and methodologies.
• Evaluate client documentation — including statements of work, RFQs, and deck plans — and recommend assumptions and solutions to strengthen proposals.
• Deliver regular technical debriefs to internal teams, sharing insights from market research, trade shows, conferences, and vendor engagements.
• Mentor and coach design team members, elevating technical skills, strengthening design judgment, and fostering professional growth.
• Cultivate a positive, collaborative work environment through effective communication, professionalism, and a solutions-oriented approach.
• Other responsibilities as assigned, in alignment with advancing company design excellence and strategic objectives.

Competencies

To perform the job successfully, an individual should demonstrate the following competencies:

Leadership Competencies

• Personal Responsibility (Modeling the Way) - You maintain clear leadership philosophy and build consensus around organization values; you make sound and timely decisions by taking calculated risk while assuming responsibility, you evoke trust by being appropriately open, honest, ethical, and consistent; you seek to eliminate inefficiencies and engage others; and you encourage organization, prioritization, follow-through, and time management.
• Direction Setting (Inspiring a Shared Vision) – You create, articulate and inspire a vision for change; you keep organizational focus on customer through expectations, involvement and feedback; you recognize importance of teams and when to use them; and you communicate expectations clearly while encouraging and recognizing accomplishments.
• Strategic Leadership (Challenging the Process) – You analyze trends/benchmarking data, develop alternatives, and identify opportunities for leverage; you set and keep focus on goals, you utilize resources effectively, you anticipate issues; you articulate a vision and encourage innovation and problem-solving to support it; and you display openness to new ideas, change and learning.
• Organizational Management (Enabling Others to Act) – You value and encourage professional and personal development through continuous learning; you delegate and support decision making; you translate strategic goals into actionable plans and remove obstacles; and you maintain cross-functional relationships and gain cooperation and support.
• Inspirational Leadership (Encouraging the Heart) – You lead by example and model the corporate values, you acknowledge mistakes and practice what is preached; you show recognition and appreciation; you create friendly and challenging environment; you treat people with dignity and respect.

Job Core Competencies

• Relationship Building - Builds rapport up, down, and across the organization, establishes collaborative relationships to achieve objectives, seeks win-win solutions to conflict, develops network of professional contacts, displays empathy, and tolerates diverse viewpoints.
• Consultative Selling – You qualify potential customers, build rapport, and establish trust; you ask questions to discover client business needs, apply product and market knowledge effectively, present solutions that meet customer objectives; and you manage and document sales process.
• Business Acumen – You understand business implications of decisions, you conduct cost-benefit analyses, you display orientation to profitability, you demonstrate knowledge of market and competition, and you align work with strategic goals.
• Problem Solving – You identify problems in a timely manner, you gather and analyze information skillfully, you develop alternative solutions, you resolve problems in early stages, and you work well in group problem solving situations.

Summary of Education, Experience & Certification

Bachelor's degree (B. S.) from four-year college or university and a minimum of 10 years of related aviation technical experience and/or training; or equivalent combination of education and experience.

Employees working on programs subject to International Traffic in Arms Regulations must qualify as a US Person which is defined as a US Citizen, a Permanent Resident who does not work for a foreign company/foreign government/foreign governmental agency or organization, or a political asylee for legal compliance purposes.

Required Knowledge, Skills & Abilities

• Ability to read, write analyze, and interpret technical specifications, journals, and legal documents. Ability to respond effectively to common inquiries or complaints from customers, regulatory agencies, or members of the business community.
• Ability to make effective and persuasive speeches and presentations on controversial or complex topics to top management or project teams.
• Strong communication, relationship, time-management, and problem-solving skills.
• Strong sense of ethics, character, and interpersonal skills.
• Ability to clearly analyze customer’s needs, steer and persuade them into win-win outcomes for the customer and GTI.
• Must possess broad technical knowledge and familiarity with the procurement of aircraft products including raw materials, parts, and commodities. Aerospace background required; aircraft interior industry experience
• Ability to mentor, motivate and pass on key skills to other relevant members of the organization.
• Demonstrated experience with Internet software; Database software; business productivity suites; Planning software; Design software packages; Project Management software; and MS Suite.
• Ability to travel domestically and internationally as required. Travel may be extensive at times.
• Ability to work outside of core business hours as required.
• Ability to work well independently and cross-functionally as part of an established and growing team.
• Strong communication, time-management, and problem-solving skills.
• Ability to influence, persuade and negotiate.
• Ability to sit for extended periods of time, use hands to lift and/or move up to 10 pounds, occasionally lift and/or move up to 25 pounds, and have close/color vision ability to adjust focus.