Application Support Engineer Specialist - MES

Application Support Engineer Specialist - MES

Reporting to: Product Manager – Software Engineering & IT Programs

Position Summary

We are seeking a hands-on MES Application Support Engineer / Specialist to provide operational and technical support for our internally developed Manufacturing Execution System (MES) and related manufacturing applications. This role serves as the primary bridge between manufacturing users, business stakeholders, and Software Engineering, with responsibility for monitoring application queues, triaging support tickets, resolving incidents, administering user access, and escalating software defects or enhancements with complete technical analysis.

The successful candidate will combine application support, database analysis, code-level investigation, and manufacturing business-process knowledge. This person must be able to determine whether an issue can be resolved through support, data correction, configuration, access administration, or requires a software change, and clearly communicate the impact, urgency, and recommended path forward.

Critical Role Expectations

• Required to work onsite three (3) days per week to support manufacturing users, production operations, and stakeholder collaboration.
• Own assigned incidents and requests from intake through resolution, validation, communication, and closure.
• Monitor business-critical application queues, integrations, scheduled jobs, alerts, and transaction failures.
• Use SQL, application logs, audit trails, and source code to investigate and isolate issues.
• Resolve supportable issues directly and route confirmed defects or change requests to Software Engineering with complete evidence and context.
• Understand end-to-end manufacturing processes and the operational impact of MES issues.
• Maintain urgency during production-impacting incidents while following data, security, and change-control requirements.

Key Responsibilities

1. Application Monitoring & Production Support
   1. Monitor MES queues, interfaces, integrations, scheduled jobs, services, transaction processing, and system alerts.
   2. Perform daily application health checks and proactively investigate failures, backlogs, and unusual processing behavior.
   3. Respond immediately to production-impacting issues and coordinate restoration of service with Operations, IT, and Software Engineering.
   4. Support planned releases, maintenance windows, validation activities, and post-deployment monitoring.
2. Incident, Request & Ticket Management
   1. Review, categorize, prioritize, and triage incoming MES incidents and service requests based on business and production impact.
   2. Resolve Level 1 and Level 2 application issues, including configuration, access, workflow, master-data, transactional, and user-process issues.
   3. Maintain accurate ticket notes, investigation details, user communications, resolution steps, and closure evidence.
   4. Escalate confirmed defects and complex technical issues to the Software Engineering queue with reproducible steps, logs, impacted records, expected versus actual behavior, severity, and business impact.
   5. Identify duplicate or recurring incidents and link them to root-cause or problem-management activities.
3. Database & Data Investigation
   1. Write and execute SQL queries to validate, reconcile, and troubleshoot MES data across relevant databases.
   2. Analyze work orders, routing, materials, inventory transactions, production records, quality results, traceability, equipment, and user activity as applicable.
   3. Determine whether an issue is caused by incorrect data, configuration, user process, integration failure, or application behavior.
   4. Perform approved data corrections using documented procedures, peer review, auditability, and change controls.
   5. Protect production data and avoid unapproved direct database changes.
4. Code Review & Change Assessment
   1. Review application code, stored procedures, scripts, APIs, services, and integration logic to understand system behavior and isolate likely failure points.
   2. Assess whether a resolution requires configuration, data correction, a minor code fix, a larger enhancement, or architectural change.
   3. Provide Software Engineering with an initial impact assessment, affected modules, dependencies, risk considerations, and suggested validation scenarios.
   4. Participate in defect review, backlog refinement, release readiness, and production verification.
5. User Access & Application Administration
   1. Provision, modify, and remove MES user access based on approved requests and defined role-based access controls.
   2. Assign appropriate roles and permissions using least-privilege principles and segregation-of-duties requirements.
   3. Support onboarding, transfers, offboarding, periodic access reviews, and audit requests.
   4. Investigate access-related issues and maintain accurate access-administration records.
6. Business Process & Stakeholder Support
   1. Develop strong knowledge of manufacturing processes supported by MES, including work orders, production execution, material movement, traceability, quality, nonconformance, equipment, and reporting.
   2. Engage directly with users and stakeholders to understand the reported issue, operational context, urgency, and expected outcome.
   3. Translate technical findings into clear business language and translate business needs into actionable technical information.
   4. Partner with Production, Manufacturing Engineering, Quality, Supply Chain, IT, Product Management, and Software Engineering to drive resolution and improvement.
7. Root Cause, Problem Management & Continuous Improvement
   1. Perform root-cause analysis for recurring, high-impact, or production-critical incidents.
   2. Identify monitoring gaps, automation opportunities, recurring failure patterns, and process improvements.
   3. Recommend preventive actions that improve system reliability, support efficiency, data quality, and user experience.
   4. Track corrective actions through implementation and confirm that recurrence risk has been reduced.
8. Documentation, Knowledge & Training
   1. Create and maintain knowledge articles, SOPs, troubleshooting guides, support runbooks, data-flow references, and escalation criteria.
   2. Document known errors, workarounds, common queries, access procedures, and support ownership boundaries.
   3. Provide user guidance and targeted training on MES functionality and correct business processes.
   4. Contribute to release notes and support-readiness materials for new or changed capabilities.
9. Security, Compliance & Operational Controls
   1. Follow applicable security, privacy, access-control, data-handling, and change-management policies.
   2. Maintain complete audit trails for access changes, data corrections, incident decisions, and production support actions.
   3. Escalate suspected security issues, inappropriate access, data integrity concerns, or unauthorized changes.
   4. Support internal and external audits by providing accurate evidence and system records.

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, Engineering, Manufacturing Technology, or equivalent practical experience.
• 3+ years of experience supporting enterprise applications, manufacturing systems, or internally developed business applications.
• Strong SQL skills and experience troubleshooting relational databases such as Microsoft SQL Server, PostgreSQL, Oracle, or equivalent.
• Ability to read and understand application code, stored procedures, APIs, scripts, and technical logs.
• Experience with incident management, ticket triage, root-cause analysis, and production support.
• Experience administering application users, roles, permissions, and access requests.
• Strong analytical skills with the ability to connect data, system behavior, and business-process impact.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to engage technical and non-technical stakeholders.
• Ability to manage multiple priorities and remain effective during urgent production incidents.
• Ability to work onsite three (3) days per week.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience supporting Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES), Factory Execution Systems (FES), ERP/MRP, or shop-floor applications.
• Knowledge of SMT/PCBA or other discrete manufacturing environments.
• Familiarity with work orders, bills of material, routings, material traceability, inventory, quality, nonconformance, and production reporting.
• Experience with C#, .NET, Java, Spring, JavaScript, Python, PowerShell, or similar technologies.
• Experience troubleshooting REST APIs, middleware, message queues, scheduled jobs, and system integrations.
• Experience with Freshservice, Jira, Azure DevOps, ServiceNow, or comparable ITSM and engineering work-management tools.
• Familiarity with Git, CI/CD concepts, release management, monitoring tools, and application deployment practices.
• Understanding of ITIL practices, software development life cycle, Agile delivery, and formal change control.
• Experience working in an access-controlled or regulated manufacturing environment.

Soft Skills

• High ownership and accountability for end-to-end issue resolution.
• Strong customer-service mindset with appropriate urgency for manufacturing operations.
• Logical, evidence-based troubleshooting and sound judgment.
• Clear, concise, and professional stakeholder communication.
• Ability to ask effective discovery questions and challenge incomplete assumptions respectfully.
• Ability to work independently while collaborating closely across business and engineering teams.
• Attention to detail, curiosity, adaptability, and a continuous-improvement mindset.

Work Environment

• Hybrid position requiring onsite presence three (3) days per week in an office and manufacturing environment.
• Direct interaction with manufacturing users, operational stakeholders, application databases, and development teams.
• Fast-paced environment where application downtime or data issues can affect production operations.
• Occasional off-hours, maintenance-window, or on-call support may be required for critical incidents, releases, or upgrades.
• Must comply with site safety, security, access, and data-handling requirements.

Success Factors

• Rapid, accurate triage and restoration of MES services with minimal production disruption.
• High-quality resolution of supportable incidents without unnecessary engineering escalation.
• Complete and actionable escalations that enable Software Engineering to diagnose and resolve issues efficiently.
• Strong data integrity, access-control discipline, and adherence to operational controls.
• Reduction in recurring incidents through root-cause analysis, monitoring, documentation, and preventive improvement.
• Trusted relationships with business users, manufacturing stakeholders, Product Management, IT, and Software Engineering.
• Consistent ownership, responsiveness, technical depth, and clear communication.