Director, Mechanical Engineering Team – Small Corporation – Alexandria, Va. or Southfield, Mich.

Landon IP Inc. Landon IPis a leading provider of professional legal and business support services throughout the intellectual property (IP) lifecycle. We are seeking a Technical Team Director will lead, manage, and grow the Mechanical Engineering Team within the Patent Search Group at Landon IP. The Director will be responsible for all project management, personnel management, customer relationship management, as well as provide business development support for the Mechanical Engineering Team. The Director is responsible for all facets of the search process from initial customer contact to final report delivery and follow‐up.

Job Responsibilities:
• Serve as key manager & leader in the company
• Manage customer relationships
− Confirm search requests and consult with customers to scope each search project
− Prepare estimates for each search project
− Maintain frequent communication and proper level of updates throughout each project
− Provide completed search deliverables to customers and conduct follow‐up to ensure customer satisfaction
− Consultatively assess customers’ needs through frequent interaction and high level assessments of their workflow
• Manage workflow
− Assign searches to appropriate patent analysts and manage each patent analyst throughout each search project
− Communicate with customer throughout each search to manage expectations
− Ensure quality of each search project through systematic review of each search
− Coordinate with other team Directors and other departments to properly staff projects as needed
• Lead, manage, and grow analyst team
− Serve as personnel manager for analysts within the team
− Responsible for ensuring growth and development of individual patent analysts including performance evaluations
− Identify training needs for analysts and work with company trainers to provide proper training
− Identify and report staffing level needs and actively participate in the hiring and candidate evaluation process
• Generate new business to meet sales goals
− Identify new customers and new avenues for business
− Visit existing and new customers with the sales team as needed
− Actively work with sales team to develop new business
− Maintain a strong understanding of current customers
− Carry out a business plan for aggressive sales growth
− Proactively seek ways to achieve the Mechanical Engineering Team sales goals

Job Requirements:
• At least 5 years patent field experience.
• Highly skilled in fast, accurate, and polished customer service.
• Possesses an entrepreneurial, big‐picture view of responsibilities.
• Significant experience and familiarity with all types of patent searches.
• Excellent writing, editing and verbal communications skills, as well as strong attention to detail.
• Management experience is a plus. Desire to expand/learn management skills required, as well as a proven ability to communicate and interact well in all situations.
• Significant experience in one of the technical disciplines above.
• Bachelor’s degree in technical area required. Graduate degree(s) a plus.
• Patent Agent or Patent Attorney preferred.

Contact:Please submit a resume and cover letter detailing your experience and salary requirements to careers@landon-ip.com.  Please reference the position title in your email subject line. ** This position can be located in either Southfield, MI or Alexandria, VA office. **

Additional Info:
Employer Type: Small Corporation
Job Location: Southfield, Michigan or Alexandria, Virginia

Our services include patent and trademark searches, analysis of new technologies, global information retrieval, patent translations, and advanced patent law training of attorneys.  The growth company is headquartered in Alexandria, Virginia; and has offices in Southfield, Michigan; El Dorado Hills, California; Tokyo, Japan; London, England; and Shanghai, China; employing over 200 people.  More information about Landon IP can be found at www.landon-ip.com.

Landon IP provides a casual and relaxed work environment focused on delighting our customers and continuously exceeding their expectations.  A hands-on training program focuses on developing knowledge and skills while allowing new employees to immediately produce results.  The company prides itself on communication with employees, assisting employees in development of their knowledge and skills, and helping employees identify and create opportunities for growth within the company.