A transfer program management team from the receiving molder usually consists of the following personnel:
Account Manager—the go-to/final say/bottom line person, responsible for coordinating and integrating the efforts of the group, with budget accountability. The AM understands the goals of each group involved and facilitates their ability to deliver per schedule.
Project Manager—the hands-on team leader, a person with a high level of technical skill and experience to comprehend the activities of each engineering discipline involved. The PM will likely have a support team of project engineers based on the size, scope and duration of the validation phase of the project.
Tooling Engineer—a senior level leader, supported by an appropriately staffed tool shop, accountable for evaluating the molds and creating the documentation required to make any needed improvements to ensure qualified product will be molded per projections.
Quality Engineer—the team leader of those people that love to measure, responsible for evaluating parts, part prints, gauges and fixtures, records, creating metrology instructions and inspection report, etc.
Process Engineer—all of those molds have to be qualified again, likely in entirely different presses. The PE and their team make certain that each mold has a robust as possible process window in the new environment (personnel, facility and equipment).
When I first became a project manager, it did not take long to realize the pain associated with a lack of resource availability and cross-functional cooperation. This includes a lack of direct project support from functional areas and having the project work low on their priority lists. There simply had to be a better way for the teams to succeed. A few years later, I became a PMP (project management professional) and then grew into the manger of project management role. As manager of multiple project managers, it made sense to me to attempt to apply project management best practices across all tech transfer projects. After all, I thought, why reinvent the wheel? I made it my goal to apply the PMBOK (Project Management Body of Knowledge) best practices. Initially it seemed daunting, but I gradually realized I only needed to apply those principles which truly added value to project teams which manage the technical transfer process.
Yes, in the mold industry, transfer is a very common operation, the correct process is very important