Control and Instrumentation Engineer

Our client is a global specialty chemicals manufacturer with fourteen manufacturing sites across Europe, the Americas and Asia-Pacific. It falls under the EU NIS2 Directive and has invested in Nozomi Networks Guardian OT monitoring for every site. Optim-G is placing a small team — an OT Security Lead and three regional control & instrumentation engineers — who get to know each plant, support its control systems and instrumentation, and form the OT security function that brings the platform live and keeps the sites compliant, while the client builds its own team. The client's name is shared with shortlisted candidates before the client interview.
About us — an engineering business, not an IT company. You join Optim-G's industrial engineering division, Talonite, which works inside live mines and process plants. Our people are control, instrumentation and process engineers who deliver on the plant floor: control loop monitoring and plant stability, advanced process control, downtime and OEE, plant data and reporting, and OT cybersecurity that protects operations without disrupting production. We work with technology partners such as Nozomi Networks and Claroty, but the product is a more stable, better-run plant, not the technology. Our teams deliver in 16 countries from a South African engineering hub and a European office in Hamburg.

1 Get to know each plant — the first priority.

• Walk every unit with the site's production, maintenance and instrumentation teams; learn the process, the control philosophy and the critical loops.
• Build and correct the plant's picture: control system architecture (DCS / PLC / SCADA / SIS), network drawings, instrument index, P&IDs and loop diagrams.
• Become the regional C&I engineer each plant calls — the person who knows how its control systems hang together.

2 Control & instrumentation support — the core of the role.

• Troubleshoot and support control systems, field instruments and analysers alongside site maintenance teams.
• Support modifications through management of change: loop checks, configuration changes, calibration and commissioning.
• Keep C&I documentation and the OT asset list accurate; advise site leadership on obsolescence, reliability and critical spares.

3 OT security — part of the function, under the OT Security Lead.

• Assist with the Nozomi Networks Guardian roll-out at your sites: site readiness, sensor placement (SPAN / TAP), commissioning, learning mode and the asset baseline.
• Follow up alerts, vulnerabilities and exposures with site owners until closed; check OT changes against the site security standard.
• Support ongoing compliance: NIS2 / IEC 62443 site assessments, the remediation register, evidence for the monthly scorecard, and first-line support in an OT security incident.

4 Hand over — make yourself replaceable.

• Write everything into the client's systems. When the client's own engineer arrives, train and shadow them until they sign off — or move across to the client yourself if they offer you the role.
• Sites covered: Waalwijk and Zwaag (Netherlands), Leinfelden-Echterdingen (Germany), Graulhet (France), Parets del Vallès (Spain), Arzignano (Italy, to be confirmed).

• A qualification in control & instrumentation, electrical, electronic or automation engineering (degree, national diploma or technician qualification).
• At least 5 years as a control & instrumentation engineer in process industry — chemicals, oil & gas, pharma, food or similar — with real plant-floor time.
• Hands-on with DCS / PLC / SCADA systems (for example Siemens, ABB, Emerson, Honeywell, Yokogawa or Rockwell) and with field instrumentation, loops and calibration.
• Working knowledge of hazardous-area practice (ATEX / IECEx or the local equivalent) and management of change on regulated sites.
• A working grasp of industrial networks — industrial Ethernet, VLANs, firewalls, the Purdue model — and a genuine interest in growing into OT security.
• Confident working alone at a site and with plant managers; clear written English for reports and documentation.
• Valid passport and driving licence; willing to travel as described below.
• Right to live and work in the Netherlands without sponsorship — EU/EEA/Swiss citizenship or an existing Dutch residence permit that allows work. We cannot sponsor a visa for this start date.

Nice to have

• Exposure to an OT security platform — Nozomi Networks, Claroty, Dragos, Tenable OT or Microsoft Defender for IoT. Training and Nozomi certification are provided.
• IEC 62443 knowledge, ISA/IEC 62443 Cybersecurity Fundamentals Specialist or GICSP.
• Functional safety (IEC 61511 / SIS) experience.
• Dutch or German (strongly preferred — the first two sites); French, Spanish or Italian a plus.
• NIS2, ISO 27001 or site safety-case experience in chemicals.

Market related salary.  Annual leave, holiday allowance, pension, equipment and business travel paid