Process Engineer CV Examples & Writing Guide
A process engineer CV is read for one thing: did your changes move a process number. Yield, scrap, cycle time, uptime, cost per unit, all with a before and after. Then the tools, the methods (DOE, FMEA, DMAIC) and your professional status (IChemE or IMechE membership, CEng). Below is a full sample CV plus personal statements, bullets and skills for manufacturing, chemical and oil and gas roles.
Process engineer CV example (manufacturing, 7 years)
A made-up engineer with a realistic record. Read the bullets and notice that each one names a process, a change and a measured effect. That is the whole format.
Priya Raghunathan
Process Engineer, Manufacturing
Telford, Shropshire · priya.raghunathan@email.com | 07700 900126 | AMIChemE, Six Sigma Black Belt
Summary
Process engineer with 7 years in high-volume injection moulding and assembly. Raised line OEE from 62% to 78% on a 3-line cell, cut scrap from 6.2% to 2.8% worth about £670k a year, and led two capital installations from URS to production sign-off. Works on the shop floor with operators, not only in the data.
Experience
Senior Process Engineer · Automotive tier 2 components supplier (620 employees), Telford
Jan 2023 - Present
- Own process performance for 3 injection moulding cells and a downstream assembly line producing 14 million parts a year across 42 part numbers.
- Raised cell OEE from 62% to 78% over 14 months by attacking changeover time (SMED, 46 to 19 minutes) and short stops, adding roughly 2,100 production hours a year.
- Cut scrap from 6.2% to 2.8% using a DOE on melt temperature, hold pressure and cooling time, saving about £670k a year in polymer and rework.
- Led a £1.8m capital installation of two 400-tonne presses with robot take-out: wrote the user requirement specification, ran factory and site acceptance testing, and hit full-rate production 3 weeks ahead of plan.
- Wrote and maintained PFMEAs and control plans for 42 part numbers; closed all 19 findings from the customer's process audit with no repeat findings the following year.
- Trained 24 operators and 4 technicians on new setup sheets and SPC charting, which cut setup-related defects by about two thirds.
Process Engineer · Powder coating and finishing company, Wolverhampton
Jul 2020 - Jan 2023
- Improved first-pass yield on a powder coat line from 91.4% to 96.5% by correcting oven profile and pretreatment chemistry control limits.
- Reduced cycle time on the main conveyor from 94 to 71 seconds per rack through line balancing and a fixture redesign, lifting capacity 24%.
- Cut chemical consumption 18% (£90k a year) by adding automated dosing control and weekly titration standards.
- Ran root cause investigations on 30+ customer complaints using 8D and fishbone analysis, with an average closure time of 11 days against a 30-day requirement.
Graduate Manufacturing Engineer · Industrial equipment manufacturer, Shropshire
Jun 2019 - Jul 2020
- Time-studied 22 workstations and rebalanced a 9-station assembly line, raising output per shift from 310 to 372 units.
- Built the standard work documentation and 5S layout for two cells, cutting operator walking distance by 40%.
Education
MEng (Hons) Chemical Engineering, 2:1
University in the West Midlands, 2019
Certifications
- Associate Member, Institution of Chemical Engineers (AMIChemE), working towards CEng
- ASQ Certified Six Sigma Black Belt
- IOSH Managing Safely, 2024
Skills
What an engineering manager checks first
The person hiring you runs a plant or a unit with specific problems. They are matching your record to those problems in about twenty seconds.
- Industry and process type. Injection moulding, machining, food, semiconductor, refining, speciality chemicals, pharma. Process engineering is not portable across all of them, and the reader wants a match fast.
- Process numbers that moved. Yield, scrap, OEE, cycle time, throughput, cost per unit, energy or chemical use. Baseline and result, both.
- Method evidence. DOE, SPC, DMAIC, 8D, FMEA. Naming the tool proves you know how to attack a problem rather than tweak settings.
- Scale of ownership. Lines, units, part numbers, volume, budget. "Supported the team" tells the reader nothing.
- Safety and compliance in the right places. Process safety, COMAH and management of change in chemical plants, validation in pharma, PPAP in automotive.
“Give me the baseline. Every CV says improved yield. The ones I call say 91.4 to 96.5 percent and then tell me what they changed in the oven profile. If the baseline is missing, I assume there was not much of an improvement.”
Process engineer personal statement examples
Three or four lines: industry, years, the process you own, two results. Write a different version for each industry you apply to. It takes ten minutes and it is the highest-return edit on the page.
Process engineer with 7 years in high-volume injection moulding and assembly. Raised cell OEE from 62% to 78%, cut scrap from 6.2% to 2.8% (about £670k a year) and led a £1.8m press installation to full rate three weeks early. ASQ Six Sigma Black Belt, AMIChemE.
Chemical process engineer with 8 years in speciality chemicals, responsible for two continuous reaction units producing 40,000 tonnes a year. Improved yield 3.4 points through a kinetics study and control loop retune, ran the HAZOP and management of change for a £4.8m debottleneck, and is a Chartered Engineer (CEng MIChemE).
Process engineer with 7 years in refining and gas processing. Owns hydrotreater and amine unit performance, completed 14 process simulations in Aspen HYSYS for turnaround planning, and delivered an energy project cutting fired duty 9% and £1.5m a year. Trained in process safety on COMAH sites and in HAZOP facilitation.
Process improvement engineer with 5 years applying lean and Six Sigma across 4 plants. Led 11 kaizen events delivering £2.1m in validated savings, cut order-to-ship lead time from 19 to 11 days, and trained 60 staff to Green Belt level. Certified Black Belt with a background in industrial engineering.
Chemical engineering graduate with a 12-month industrial placement in food manufacturing and a final-year design project on heat exchanger optimisation. Ran a DOE during the placement that cut filler downtime 22%, uses Minitab and Aspen Plus, and is a student member of IChemE. Looking for a process engineer role in manufacturing or the process industries.
Process engineer experience bullets: weak versus strong
The formula: what you changed, using which method, and the measured effect with a baseline. Cost the effect in pounds whenever you can, because that is the language plant managers budget in.
| Weak | Strong |
|---|---|
| Responsible for improving manufacturing processes. | Owned process performance for 3 moulding cells and an assembly line producing 14 million parts a year across 42 part numbers. |
| Reduced scrap and rework. | Cut scrap from 6.2% to 2.8% with a DOE on melt temperature, hold pressure and cooling time, saving about £670k a year in polymer and rework. |
| Improved equipment efficiency. | Raised cell OEE from 62% to 78% in 14 months by cutting changeover time from 46 to 19 minutes and eliminating the top three short-stop causes. |
| Worked on capital projects. | Led a £1.8m installation of two 400-tonne presses: wrote the URS, ran FAT and SAT, and reached full-rate production 3 weeks ahead of schedule. |
| Created process documentation. | Wrote and maintained PFMEAs and control plans for 42 part numbers and closed all 19 customer audit findings with no repeats the next year. |
| Investigated quality issues. | Ran 30+ customer complaint investigations using 8D and fishbone analysis, closing them in 11 days on average against a 30-day requirement. |
| Optimised a chemical process. | Retuned pretreatment chemistry control limits and the oven profile, lifting first-pass yield on the powder coat line from 91.4% to 96.5%. |
| Reduced costs. | Installed automated dosing control and weekly titration standards, cutting chemical consumption 18% and £90k a year. |
| Supported production with troubleshooting. | Reduced main conveyor cycle time from 94 to 71 seconds per rack through line balancing and a fixture redesign, adding 24% capacity. |
| Trained employees on new procedures. | Trained 24 operators and 4 technicians on new setup sheets and SPC charting, cutting setup-related defects by roughly two thirds. |
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Process engineer CV skills, split three ways
Methods, software, and the processes and equipment you actually know. That last group is what makes you the right candidate for one plant and the wrong one for another, so be specific.
Methods and analysis:
- Design of experiments, regression, capability studies (Cp, Cpk)
- Statistical process control and control chart design
- Six Sigma DMAIC, lean tools: SMED, 5S, value stream mapping, standard work
- PFMEA, control plans, APQP and PPAP for automotive supply (IATF 16949)
- Root cause analysis: 8D, fishbone, 5 why, fault tree
- Time studies, line balancing, takt and cycle time analysis
- Mass and energy balances, heat and material transfer calculations
Software and systems:
- Minitab or JMP for statistics
- Aspen HYSYS or Aspen Plus for process simulation (chemical, refining, gas)
- AutoCAD and SolidWorks for layouts, fixtures and P&ID markups
- SAP or another ERP, MES and plant data historians
- PLC and HMI familiarity, enough to work with controls engineers
- Python, SQL or Power BI if you pull and analyse plant data yourself
Processes and equipment: name yours plainly. Injection moulding, extrusion, CNC machining, welding, coating, distillation, crystallisation, fermentation, filling and packaging, heat exchangers, pumps and compressors, reactors, dryers. Add the compliance layer that fits your industry: process safety, COMAH and management of change in chemicals and refining, GMP and IQ/OQ/PQ validation in pharma, HACCP and BRCGS in food, and PUWER machine guarding and lock-out/tag-out everywhere.
Degree, chartership and the certifications worth listing
Most process engineer adverts ask for a degree (BEng, MEng or BSc) in chemical, mechanical, manufacturing or production engineering. What you add on top depends on the industry.
- Professional institution membership. Associate membership of IChemE or IMechE (AMIChemE, AMIMechE) is worth listing early in your career. It shows you are on the path to chartership.
- Chartered Engineer (CEng) or Incorporated Engineer (IEng). Not a legal requirement for most process roles, but expected in consultancy and design work and valued in refining and chemicals. Name the institution you registered through, such as IChemE, IMechE or the IET.
- Six Sigma Green Belt or Black Belt. Widely asked for in manufacturing. Say who certified you, because an internal company belt and an externally accredited certification are different things and hiring managers know it.
- Lean certifications and formal kaizen facilitation training.
- An APM project qualification, PRINCE2 or PMP if you run capital projects and want project engineer or project manager roles too.
- IOSH Managing Safely or a NEBOSH certificate, and process safety training such as HAZOP facilitation if you work in chemicals or refining.
- A master's degree or EngD helps in research-heavy process development, but plant roles usually value plant years more.
Professional status: Chartered Engineer (CEng), MIChemE, 2024 | ASQ Certified Six Sigma Black Belt, 2022 (recertified 2025) | IOSH Managing Safely, 2024
Six Sigma Green Belt (internal certification, current employer, 2024; two completed projects with validated savings).
Graduate and entry-level process engineer CV
Without plant years, the page has to be built from industrial placements, summer internships, projects and lab work. Recruiters know that. What they will not forgive is a graduate CV with no numbers in it.
- 1Put your industrial placement and internships above education, and write them like a job: what process, what you were asked to fix, what you measured.
- 2Give the final-year design project its own entry with the technical scope, the tools used and the result, even if the result is a calculated one.
- 3List software honestly with a level: "Aspen Plus (coursework and design project)" is better than an unqualified line that falls apart in the interview.
- 4Join IChemE or IMechE as a student member and target accredited graduate schemes. It shows you are on the path to chartership and separates you from much of the pile of graduate CVs.
- 5Add lab and workshop skills: titration, chromatography, tensile testing, machining, welding. Plants hire graduates who are not afraid of the shop floor.
Ran a 2-factor DOE on filler head timing and vacuum during a 12-month food manufacturing placement, cutting line downtime 22% and giving back about 90 production hours per quarter.
Modelled a shell-and-tube heat exchanger network in Aspen Plus for a final-year design project, identifying a configuration that reduced calculated steam duty 14% at a 2.4-year payback.
Ran 120 reactor batches at bench scale, logged conditions and yields, and built the regression model the group used to select two conditions for pilot testing.
Retargeting the same CV for oil and gas, chemicals or manufacturing
Process engineer means different things in different industries, and one generic CV does badly everywhere. Keep one master file and cut three versions.
| If you are applying to | Lead with |
|---|---|
| Discrete manufacturing (automotive, electronics, consumer goods) | OEE, cycle time, scrap, changeover, PFMEA and control plans, PPAP, operator training, capital installs. |
| Chemicals and refining | Unit ownership, yield and conversion, simulation work, heat and mass balances, HAZOP and management of change, turnaround scope, energy projects. |
| Oil and gas processing | Aspen HYSYS models, separator and compressor performance, flare and relief studies, process safety on COMAH sites, turnaround and commissioning experience. |
| Pharmaceutical and biotech | GMP, validation (IQ/OQ/PQ), batch record and deviation handling, tech transfer, cleaning validation, scale-up from pilot. |
| Food and drink | HACCP, BRCGS and food safety, sanitation and changeover, line efficiency, giveaway and overfill control, allergen changeovers. |
| Process improvement / continuous improvement roles | Validated savings, number of events led, people trained, lead time and inventory reductions, cross-plant deployment. |
Format, length and keywords
- Two pages is the UK norm for an experienced engineer; a graduate can usually fit on one. Go beyond two only with a separate project list.
- No photo, no date of birth, no marital status. UK convention.
- Plain single-column PDF. Skip skill rating bars; nobody believes a 4-out-of-5 in Minitab.
- Put a short technical skills block near the top, because engineering recruiters scan it before the work history.
- If you have patents or published papers, one line each at the bottom, no abstracts.
Mirror the advert's exact terms: process improvement, yield, scrap, OEE, cycle time, throughput, root cause, DOE, SPC, Cpk, PFMEA, control plan, DMAIC, lean, kaizen, SMED, capital project, commissioning, P&ID, management of change, validation, PPAP, Minitab, Aspen, SAP. Applicant tracking systems at large manufacturers filter hard on these.
Last check: your personal statement's year count should match your dates, and any £ saving in the personal statement should appear again, with its method, in the job where you earned it.
Frequently asked questions
How do I write a process engineer CV?
Lead with a personal statement naming your industry, your years, the process you own and two results with baselines. List jobs newest first with four to six bullets, each with a method and a measured effect. Add a technical skills block split into methods, software and processes, then your degree and professional status. Keep it to two pages at most.
What skills should a process engineer put on a CV?
Methods (DOE, SPC, capability studies, DMAIC, lean tools, PFMEA and control plans, 8D root cause), software (Minitab or JMP, Aspen HYSYS or Plus, CAD, ERP and MES, plus Python or Power BI if you use them) and the actual processes and equipment you know. The process list matters most, because it decides whether you fit the plant.
What should a process engineer personal statement say?
Four things in three lines: industry and years, the scope you own (lines, units, part numbers, volume), two quantified results with baselines, and your key credential such as CEng, IChemE membership or a Six Sigma belt. Rewrite it for each industry you apply to rather than keeping one general version.
How do I write a graduate process engineer CV?
Put your industrial placement and internships above education and write them like real jobs, with the process, the problem and what you measured. Give your final-year design project its own entry. List software with an honest level, add lab and workshop skills, and include student membership of IChemE or IMechE. One page, and make sure at least half your bullets contain a number.
Do I need to be chartered to be a process engineer?
Usually not. Most manufacturing and plant process engineering roles do not require CEng, and many engineers never apply for it. It matters more in consultancy, design and some refining and utility work, and it can be a tiebreaker for senior roles. Joining IChemE or IMechE early and keeping a record of your professional development is a low-cost way to keep the door open.
How is a chemical process engineer CV different from a manufacturing one?
The metrics change. Chemical and refining CVs lead with unit ownership, yield and conversion, simulation work, heat and mass balances, HAZOP and management of change, and turnaround scope. Manufacturing CVs lead with OEE, cycle time, scrap, changeover, PFMEA and control plans. Keep one master file and cut a version for each.
How long should a process engineer CV be?
Two pages for most experienced engineers, which is the normal UK length; one page is enough for a graduate. If you carry a long capital project and patent list, add it as a short appendix, so long as it holds projects and results rather than a list of software you touched once.
Should I include projects that failed or were cancelled?
Yes, if you learned something measurable and can describe it honestly. A cancelled capital project still shows scope, budget and the technical work you did, and a failed trial that produced a clear root cause is good engineering. Phrase it as what you found and what changed, and avoid blaming a former employer.
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How this page was made: a first draft was written with AI assistance from cvplex's example library, then edited and fact-checked by the cvplex Careers Team. Examples are fictional composites; numbers are illustrative. Report an error via the editorial policy page.