Tech Project Lead (Volunteer) 483
About Helpful Engineering
Helpful Engineering is a global engineering innovation hub dedicated to developing technologies and solutions that address pressing societal challenges. Through our Innovation Labs, volunteers, researchers, engineers, and industry professionals collaborate to develop technologies that create measurable social impact. Partnerships are a critical component of our innovation model, enabling projects to access expertise, technologies, facilities, mentorship, and prototype development resources.
Role Overview The Technical Project Lead serves as the leader for product development projects, providing both project leadership and technical guidance from concept through reference design. This individual helps to define project direction, coordinate execution, and ensure technical decisions support project objectives.
While the Technical Project Lead is not expected to be the technical expert in every discipline, you should be comfortable participating in technical discussions, reviewing design concepts, identifying risks, and helping the team navigate engineering tradeoffs.
Key Responsibilities
Lead a multidisciplinary team through all phases of early product development
Define project scope, objectives, milestones, and success criteria in collaboration with stakeholders
Translate user and stakeholder needs into actionable engineering deliverables
Facilitate technical discussions and design reviews while encouraging collaborative problem solving
Coordinate activities across engineering, manufacturing, industrial design, public health, clinical, and other functional disciplines
Guide engineering tradeoff decisions by considering performance, manufacturability, usability, cost, reliability, and implementation
Identify technical and project risks early and develop mitigation strategies
Help prioritize work, allocate project resources, and maintain execution against project goals
Support prototype planning, fabrication, testing, and verification activities
Ensure project documentation, design decisions, and technical outputs are organized and communicated effectively
Foster an inclusive, collaborative, and mission-driven team environment
Preferred Skills
Experience with engineering product development, including concept development, prototyping, iterative design, and verification
Ability to communicate effectively with both technical and non-technical stakeholders.
Demonstrated ability to organize work, establish priorities, and drive projects to completion
Experience making informed technical decisions while balancing competing constraints
Comfortable working in environments with evolving requirements and limited resources
Passion for humanitarian engineering, public health innovation, or mission-driven technology development
Preferred Background
Candidates may come from a wide range of engineering and product development backgrounds. Experience in one or more of the following is beneficial:
Mechanical systems or product design
Materials selection and manufacturing processes
Industrial or manufacturing engineering
Medical devices or healthcare technologies
Consumer products or industrial equipment
Prototype development and testing
Design verification and validation
Risk management or systems engineering
Design for Manufacturability (DFM) and Design for Assembly (DFA)
Product lifecycle or new product development
Graduate students and experienced professionals are both encouraged to apply.
Benefits
Help shape a global innovation ecosystem
Work directly with Helpful Engineering leadership
Build relationships across academia, industry, and nonprofit sectors
Support technologies addressing critical societal challenges
Develop experience in innovation partnerships and ecosystem strategy
Flexible and fully remote engagement
Ready to Apply?
If you are excited to leverage your human resources expertise to create meaningful global impact, we want to hear from you! Even if you don’t meet every qualification, we encourage you to apply—your perspective and passion may be exactly what we need.
This is an unpaid volunteer position at a nonprofit organization.
Join us in engineering the future of sustainability.
Apply now or learn more about us at:
helpfulengineering.org