Chargers combine power electronics, enclosures, software and cables, then are installed in car parks, depots and homes. A small team of engineers, assemblers and installers must work together in a young, fast-moving field.
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Share your requirementsAn EV charging equipment manufacturer builds AC and DC chargers and their parts: power modules, control boards, enclosures, cables and connectors, plus firmware and back-end software. A small plant assembles boards and boxes, tests each unit under load and ships to site. Teams are mixed. Power electronics and firmware engineers are young and in demand, assemblers and testers are trained inside the plant, and installation crews work at customer sites, often in public places. The product is new, standards and customer demands change, and volumes are uneven as orders arrive from fleet operators, builders and charging networks. Safety matters at every step, since the unit connects a high-power supply to a vehicle that people will touch. Related reading: HR for manufacturing.
These are the places the people side of this kind of business tends to give way. The rest of this page works through them.
HR here has to work for each of these groups, not only the office. The set-up below is written with all of them in mind.
GullyHR runs talent acquisition for permanent roles in EV charging equipment manufacturers. For each role we agree the job description with you, find and screen candidates against it, and support the offer through to joining. Tell us the role and the number of people, and we start there.
We recruit permanent employees. We do not supply contract or temporary staff.
Every business interviews, but few have a written process that works the same way for every role and every interviewer. GullyHR designs yours, from the role brief to the offer, trains your managers to run it, and can run it for you on the roles you hand us.
We agree what the role must deliver, the must-have and nice-to-have skills, and how each will be scored.
Screening call, assessment, interview rounds and decision points, sized to the role and the number of people you hire.
Structured questions for each role family and a rating guide, so two interviewers judge the same answer the same way.
A short briefing for your managers on what to ask, what to avoid and how to give a clear yes or no.
Who approves, how the offer is made, and how candidates are kept informed from first call to joining.
A few good power electronics and firmware people carry the product, and larger firms and start-ups with funding offer more.
Designs change between batches, and assemblers repeat the learning with each version, with changes passed by word of mouth.
Load tests on high-power units take time and care, and pressure to ship leads to shortened runs.
Each site has its own supply, wiring and approvals, and installers make judgement calls alone, often in the open or at night.
A firmware change affects the field, but the installers hear of it from customers, not from colleagues.
A charger that fails in a car park is seen by drivers, and service staff take calls at odd hours with unclear escalation.
Titles such as commissioning engineer or field validation lead mean different things in different firms, so hiring and pay are guesses.
Headcount doubles in a year, onboarding is informal and the founders still hire from their own network.
Start with the topics that matter most here: Retention and Attrition Management; Onboarding and Probation; Compensation, Payroll and Benefits. Then work through the rest. Each topic is written for manufacturing, not in general.
Who leaves, when, why — and which of them mattered.
A first day that is the same for the fifth joiner as the first.
Salary structure, payroll inputs and a month that closes on time.
How many people, in which roles, by when — and what they will cost.
Structure, reporting lines and who is allowed to decide what.
Requisition to joining, the same way every time.
Records, attendance, leave and the day-to-day HR that must simply work.
Goals, reviews and ratings that hold up in a conversation.
Training planned from need rather than from the calendar.
Named backups for the roles that cannot be vacant.
Communication, recognition and the conditions people actually work in.
Two routes — one for complaints, one for conduct — kept separate.
Policies a manager can apply, and obligations with owners and dates.
Induction, records, incident reporting and follow-through.
Resignation to relieving letter, in a defined order.
Records that survive people, and approvals that do not queue.
A short monthly pack management actually reads.
An HR function that runs the same way every month.
The pieces a EV charging equipment manufacturers business puts in place, in an order that makes each easier. Open any card for the detail.
Plain role descriptions and a simple grade structure for electronics, firmware, test, install and service staff, so hiring and pay follow a pattern.
Plain role descriptions and a simple grade structure for electronics, firmware, test, install and service staff, so hiring and pay follow a pattern. See compensation benchmarking.
A one-page change note with each design revision, shown at the station and signed by the line lead before assembly.
A one-page change note with each design revision, shown at the station and signed by the line lead before assembly.
A defined load test per unit with a record and a named technician who can hold a shipment.
A defined load test per unit with a record and a named technician who can hold a shipment.
A pre-visit checklist, a safe-working routine and a remote support contact on call.
A pre-visit checklist, a safe-working routine and a remote support contact on call. Fits a workplace health, safety and wellbeing approach.
A release note shared with install and service staff before every update, and a regular call between engineers and the field.
A release note shared with install and service staff before every update, and a regular call between engineers and the field.
A written plan for the first month for each role group, with a buddy and a check-in at thirty and ninety days.
A written plan for the first month for each role group, with a buddy and a check-in at thirty and ninety days. Use the employee onboarding process.
Before changing anything, find out what is true today. These checks take an afternoon and tell you which of the topics above to start with.
Share your requirementsConfirm with a qualified professional. What applies to you depends on your business, your state and your arrangements, and it changes. This page describes practice. It does not state a legal position.
The services below fit this kind of business best. Each starts by recording where you stand, and every later report compares against that. We do not promise outcomes.
A clear view of pay for scarce power electronics and firmware engineers.
A structured start for fast-growing teams, so know-how is not carried by memory.
Safe-working routines for test benches and field installation.
Hiring engineers, technicians and installers in a young and competitive field.
Start with a free conversation, or see the paid HR Diagnostic.
Understand the business, its workforce, current processes and HR challenges.
Find the missing, weak, inconsistent or person-dependent processes.
Create the structure, processes, policies, SOPs, dashboards and systems needed.
Help HR and department managers actually adopt the new system.
Digitise repetitive and approval-based workflows where it is worth doing.
Track hiring, attendance, employee cost, performance, training and attrition.
Strengthen the people-management system continuously, not once.
From the GullyHR blog: one on HR in manufacturing, and one on each of the topics this page points to.
Why the best operator often struggles as shift supervisor, what it costs the line, and a practical way to choose, prepare and back new supervisors in any kind of plant.
7 min readRead article
What really keeps mobile app and web developers in a small firm: stay conversations, growth paths, fair release rules and a risk sheet an owner can use this month.
6 min readRead article
A first-week plan for bringing in an outside specialist: what access to give, how to protect client data, and the confidentiality steps to settle on day one.
7 min readRead article
Simple variable pay structures for product and engineering teams: four options, why individual metrics backfire, a build plan and a one page outline to adapt.
6 min readRead articleMore on the GullyHR blog.
Offer interesting work, a path to technical lead, fair pay checked against the market and a stake in outcomes where possible. Clear recognition matters as much as money.
Use a one-page change note signed by the line lead, shown at the station and briefed before work starts.
Give a site checklist, a remote support number and a rule to stop and call when conditions are unclear.
Share a short release note before each update and hold a regular call between engineers and field staff.
Early, with plain role descriptions, an onboarding plan and a pay structure. It is cheaper than fixing messy titles after the team doubles.
We would ask which engineers you cannot lose, how design changes reach assemblers and how installers are prepared. A good opening job is a role and grade framework with an onboarding plan. Scope and fee are agreed in writing.
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