Quality Manager, Maintenance Operations

Austin, Texas, USA; Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas, USA; Houston, Texas, USA; Phoenix, Arizona, USA3-7 years

About Zipline

Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service. We are on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. We design, build, and operate the world’s largest autonomous logistics system, delivering critical supplies quickly and reliably. Today, Zipline operates on four continents, makes a delivery somewhere in the world every 30 seconds, and has completed millions of deliveries to date, including blood, vaccines, medical supplies, food, and retail products.

Our customers include the world’s largest and most prominent healthcare systems, governments, retailers, restaurants and global businesses who rely on us to save lives, reduce emissions, increase economic opportunity, and provide delivery from point A to point B as fast as possible. The drone is only 15% of what we’ve built to enable seamless, reliable, global operations.

Our system strengthens supply chains, reduces congestion, and gives people time back. With more than 140 million commercial autonomous miles safely flown, Zipline is redefining access to healthcare, consumer products, and food across the globe.

We operate at a global scale and are looking for practical problem solvers who thrive on real-world challenges and rapid growth. Our team is motivated by building systems that have a direct, meaningful impact on people’s lives and by scaling the future of logistics. We are seeking people who sculpt from first principles, enjoy facing adversity, and can do the impossible at record breaking speeds.

About You and The Role

Do you thrive on honing in a process to perfection? Identifying gaps, seeking root causes, and delivering solutions? Are you analytical, inquisitive, resourceful, and keen to build something new? Do you enjoy work that is varied in nature? The Maintenance Quality Manager will build the operating system that ensures maintenance repairs are consistent, measurable, and effective across Zipline’s U.S. operations. Your goal is not simply to find defects, but to build a system that identifies quality gaps, supports root cause analysis, and confirms corrective actions are effective.

This is a hands-on, field-oriented role. You will combine observations from technicians and site visits with maintenance and reliability data, then work across Maintenance Operations, Engineering, Training, Safety, and Supply Chain to turn findings into durable improvements. Success requires strong systems thinking, practical judgment, and the ability to influence teams through evidence and trust.

What You'll Do

• Define the metrics and review mechanisms that make maintenance quality visible, using fleet health, reliability, repeat-failure, and maintenance-record data to identify systemic issues and establish priorities.
• Define inspection criteria, acceptance requirements, and return-to-service controls for preventive and corrective maintenance.
• Lead nonconformance and corrective-action activities from containment and root-cause analysis through action ownership, effectiveness verification, and prevention of recurrence.
• Build and continuously improve the Maintenance Quality Management System, including standards, governance, document control, audit processes, corrective actions, and performance reporting.
• Define metrics that measure the effectiveness of aircraft repairs by repair type and develop reporting for maintenance management and executive leadership.
• Partner with Engineering, Training, Technical Publications, and Supply Chain to translate quality findings into improved procedures, training, tooling, parts, and aircraft designs.
• Drive initiatives that reduce repeat repairs, minimize downtime, and decrease process variation.

What You'll Bring

Necessary Qualifications

• 3–7 years of experience in maintenance quality, operational quality, reliability, field service, or a related discipline supporting complex, field-deployed hardware.
• Strong field credibility and technical curiosity, with the ability to understand complex mechanical, electrical, or electromechanical systems, ask insightful questions, and challenge assumptions.
• Proven track record of influencing cross-functional teams, driving organizational change, and maintaining high quality standards without creating unnecessary process or bureaucracy.
• Strong knowledge of root-cause analysis and structured problem-solving methodologies, including 5 Whys, fishbone analysis, 8D, and fault-tree analysis.
• Proficiency in SQL and data analysis and visualization tools such as Python, Tableau, Looker, Power BI, or ThoughtSpot.
• Demonstrated analytical ability to define meaningful performance metrics, work with imperfect operational data, distinguish isolated defects from systemic issues, and validate the effectiveness of corrective actions.
• Strong expertise in audits, nonconformance management, root-cause analysis, corrective actions, change control, and effectiveness verification.
• Excellent program management skills, including assigning ownership, managing competing priorities and risks, escalating issues appropriately, and ensuring timely completion of action items.
• Willingness to travel to maintenance sites and work directly with technicians and operational teams.

Desired qualifications

• Experience leveraging AI tools to advance data analysis and visualization, develop low-code user interfaces and tools, and synthesize information.
• Working knowledge of quality standards such as ISO 9001, AS9100, or similar regulated quality frameworks.
• Experience leading continuous improvement initiatives using Lean, Six Sigma, or similar methodologies.

What Else You Need To Know

The Quality discipline at Zipline will require routine field presence around the Zipline network. While the position is eligible to be based in any of Zipline’s operating metro areas, travel to other operational sites may be required up to 50% of the time.

Zipline is an equal opportunity employer and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type without regard to race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local laws or our own sensibilities.

We value diversity at Zipline and welcome applications from those who are traditionally underrepresented in tech. If you like the sound of this position but are not sure if you are the perfect fit, please apply!

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