This associate role is part of the Corporate Engineering & Technology team supporting Southern Glazer’s national distribution network. The role is designed for early-career talent who wants to solve operational problems through engineering thinking, technology enablement, process improvement, analytics, and solution design.
About the Program
The NextGen Operations Program- Engineering is a one-year rotational development program built to grow future engineering and technology team members who understand how distribution operations run and how to improve them through practical, scalable solutions. Associates will gain exposure to warehouse operations, automation systems, WMS functionality, operational data, system messaging, technology deployments, and the flow of information between business processes, equipment, systems, and integration partners.
This program is ideal for someone with a background in engineering, information systems, computer engineering, robotics, industrial engineering, supply chain technology, analytics, or a related field who enjoys solving operational and process problems. The right candidate wants to understand how systems, equipment, people, data, and processes connect, then use that understanding to engineer better ways of working.
Throughout the program, you’ll support real initiatives across the distribution network, own hands-on deployment and run-the-business work, spend time on-site with operations, and contribute to projects involving automation functionality, WMS/system integration, process simulation, bottleneck analysis, data science, and predictive modeling.
What to Expect from the Program
- Rotate through key Corporate Engineering & Technology focus areas while also owning hands-on technology deployments, run-the-business support work, and continuous improvement efforts tied to real distribution needs.
- Spend time on-site at distribution locations to understand how warehouse operations, automation equipment, WMS functionality, messaging flows, and fulfillment processes work in the real environment.
- Support solutioning work such as scenario modeling, bottleneck identification, digital twin concepts, simulation analysis, and recommendations that improve performance or reduce cost.
- Partner with engineering, operations, technology, and vendor teams to ask the right questions, understand business needs, and turn operational challenges into practical engineering and technology solutions.
- Complete a Capstone Project focused on a real engineering or technology opportunity, presenting your analysis, recommendations, and impact to SGWS leaders.
Graduates of the program may continue to grow within the Corporate Engineering & Technology team or move into operations-facing engineering and technology support roles that stay close to the day-to-day business. The program is designed to open multiple paths. Whether the next step is supporting automation, leading technology deployments, improving warehouse processes, helping sites run the business more effectively, building data-driven tools, evaluating new technology, or serving as a bridge between operations and technical teams, the experience gives associates a strong foundation to understand how the business works, support how it runs today, and help shape how it evolves.
