Principal Designer

About the Role

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.

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

Leadership Competencies

• Personal Responsibility (Modeling the Way): Maintain clear leadership philosophy and build consensus around organization values; make sound and timely decisions by taking calculated risk while assuming responsibility; evoke trust by being appropriately open, honest, ethical, and consistent; seek to eliminate inefficiencies and engage others; encourage organization, prioritization, follow-through, and time management.
• Direction Setting (Inspiring a Shared Vision): Create, articulate and inspire a vision for change; keep organizational focus on customer through expectations, involvement and feedback; recognize importance of teams and when to use them; communicate expectations clearly while encouraging and recognizing accomplishments.
• Strategic Leadership (Challenging the Process): Analyze trends/benchmarking data, develop alternatives, and identify opportunities for leverage; set and keep focus on goals; utilize resources effectively; anticipate issues; articulate a vision and encourage innovation and problem-solving to support it; display openness to new ideas, change and learning.
• Organizational Management (Enabling Others to Act): Value and encourage professional and personal development through continuous learning; delegate and support decision making; translate strategic goals into actionable plans and remove obstacles; maintain cross-functional relationships and gain cooperation and support.
• Inspirational Leadership (Encouraging the Heart): Lead by example and model corporate values; acknowledge mistakes and practice what is preached; show recognition and appreciation; create a friendly and challenging environment; 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: Qualify potential customers, build rapport, and establish trust; ask questions to discover client business needs; apply product and market knowledge effectively; present solutions that meet customer objectives; manage and document sales process.
• Business Acumen: Understand business implications of decisions; conduct cost-benefit analyses; display orientation to profitability; demonstrate knowledge of market and competition; align work with strategic goals.
• Problem Solving: Identify problems in a timely manner; gather and analyze information skillfully; develop alternative solutions; resolve problems in early stages; work well in group problem solving situations.

Requirements

• 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 (US Citizen, Permanent Resident, or political asylee).
• 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 the company.
• Broad technical knowledge and familiarity with the procurement of aircraft products including raw materials, parts, and commodities.
• Aerospace background required; aircraft interior industry experience preferred.
• 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.
• 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.

Pay

The expected salary range for this position in Washington is between $99,000.00 and $137,000.00. Actual compensation will be determined based on experience, education, location, and other factors permitted by law.

Benefits

• Healthcare (medical, dental & vision)
• Life insurance
• Paid time off
• 401(k) savings plan with company match

About the Company

Greenpoint delivers nose-to-tail VIP Jet aircraft interiors for private clients and Heads-of-State. We are proud to be known in the aerospace industry for our design and engineering innovation, award-winning company culture, and on-time delivery of our beautiful products. We use leading-edge tools and employee-built processes to deliver extraordinary, one-of-a-kind custom aircraft interiors. It’s complex work, but we work smart. In return for hard work, collaboration, and creativity, our people experience a culture custom built for high achievers:

• Big jobs and stretch assignments.
• High accountability environment, with transparent decisions aligned to values, open communication, and engaged leadership.
• Ability to make a big, visible impact on the end product.