Process Controls Engineer

At The Hershey Company, our culture is rooted in purpose and inspired by Milton Hershey’s enduring vision that business should create opportunity for others. Through our commitment to corporate philanthropy, we create positive impact by supporting communities, helping children thrive, and operating as a business for good. This includes our deep and long standing partnership with Milton Hershey School, where we invest in education, workforce readiness, and hands on engagement to help students succeed beyond the classroom. Supported by strategic grantmaking, product donations, cross brand collaboration, and strong employee volunteerism, Hershey offers a place to work where making a difference—locally and globally—is part of how we do business every day.

Location: Bluffton, IN

About the Hershey Company

At The Hershey Company, we make more moments of goodness through some of the world's most iconic brands, including Hershey's, Reese's, Kit Kat®, Jolly Rancher, Twizzlers, Dot's Pretzels, Lesser Evil and more. Our team supports a global portfolio of over 90 brands, creating opportunities to shape strategies and drive impact across a breadth of businesses that few companies can offer. While many organizations focus on a handful of brands, Hershey provides exposure to a diverse portfolio of category-leading brands enjoyed by consumers around the world. What truly sets us apart is our legacy. Inspired by Milton Hershey's belief that business should create opportunity for others, we have been making a positive impact for more than a century through our commitment to communities, philanthropy, and our longstanding partnership with Milton Hershey School. When you join Hershey, you become part of a company where purpose, growth, and making a difference are woven into how we do business every day.

How will you fit in the big picture?

The Associate Manager, Process Controls supports reliable, efficient manufacturing at the Bluffton plant, which produces products including Dot's Pretzels and Pirate's Booty in a high-speed, complex environment. In this role, you will execute defined scopes of automation, packaging, and control system projects and provide hands-on technical support for plant electrical and control systems. You will collaborate with Engineering, Operations, Maintenance, equipment suppliers, and external project teams during design, installation, testing, startup, troubleshooting, and optimization. Your work will help strengthen system performance, reliability, safety, documentation, and cybersecurity while advancing practical, incremental improvements across processing and packaging operations.

What will you do?

Technical Delivery: Execute assigned engineering tasks and technical delivery for control and packaging system projects, ensuring alignment with established designs, specifications, engineering standards, architectural requirements, and project timelines.

Automation and Controls: Design, develop, integrate, and optimize automated process and packaging systems using technologies such as PLCs, HMIs, robotics, vision systems, servo systems, industrial networks, digital controls, instrumentation, motor controls, distributed control systems, and control safety systems.

Plant Technical Support: Provide technical leadership and support to Operations and Maintenance teams for troubleshooting, root cause analysis, problem resolution, and optimization of electrical controls, automation, networking, power distribution, industrial computer systems, and related manufacturing equipment.

Project Execution: Support equipment checkout, testing, installation, and startup; coordinate with internal and external project teams, contractors, vendors, engineers, manufacturing supervision, and production employees; and engineer practical solutions for assigned scopes.

Continuous Improvement: Lead or participate in improvement efforts that enhance equipment reliability, system performance, maintainability, and productivity, including practical use of new technologies and replacement of obsolete or less productive systems.

Documentation and Software Control: Maintain accurate, current, and secure electrical drawings, control-system software, specifications, and technical records for assigned systems.

Safety, Security, and Compliance: Apply applicable food-industry, construction, electrical, safety, and cybersecurity requirements, including NFPA 70E and plant standards, when developing and supporting technical solutions.

Technical Analysis: Prepare or support cost estimates, feasibility assessments, specifications, alternatives, and recommendations for capital and operational solutions.

Operational Response: Serve as a technical resource for process control and automation systems and respond to critical operational issues outside normal business hours, including nights, weekends, and holidays, as required to support continuous manufacturing operations.