Principal Engineer, Mission Software

Overview

We’re looking for a Principal Engineer, Mission Systems to lead Quindar’s Command & Control (C2) and Ground Systems Integration teams. This role combines technical leadership, software and systems architecture, and people management to deliver mission-critical capabilities for commercial and government space operations.

Responsibilities

• Lead and mentor a multidisciplinary engineering team focused on Command & Control (C2) software and Ground Systems Integration capabilities
• Drive technical execution across mission systems programs, balancing delivery timelines, system reliability, and long-term architectural scalability
• Serve as system and software architect for strategic government and defense programs leveraging Quindar’s platform
• Define and evolve software architecture across distributed systems, mission operations tooling, integration layers, and operator-facing applications
• Collaborate closely with product, mission operations, customer success, and executive leadership to translate mission requirements into scalable technical solutions
• Guide the team through complex integration efforts involving third-party systems, mission partners, and government stakeholders
• Maintain hands-on involvement in technical design and software development, contributing directly to architecture reviews, implementation strategy, and critical code paths
• Support hiring and organizational growth for mission software engineering functions
• Mentor engineers and technical leads, helping develop technical depth, ownership, and leadership across the organization
• Coordinate with Engineering and Product leadership to proactively identify architectural gaps, technical risks, and cross-team dependencies
• Contribute to engineering standards, operational excellence, incident response processes, and post-mortem reviews
• Communicate technical concepts, program status, and architectural decisions clearly across technical and non-technical stakeholders

Requirements

• Proven experience leading complex software engineering efforts in aerospace, defense, mission operations, autonomy, robotics, or other high-reliability domains
• Strong software architecture experience across distributed systems, backend infrastructure, APIs, operator tooling, and mission-critical applications
• Experience serving as a technical lead, systems architect, or chief engineer on large-scale customer or government programs
• Demonstrated ability to lead and mentor engineering teams while remaining deeply technical and hands-on
• Experience integrating software systems across multiple teams, vendors, or external mission partners
• Strong understanding of software development life cycles, systems engineering principles, and Agile development methodologies
• Ability to code and review production-quality code in languages relevant to Quindar’s technology stack
• Excellent communication and leadership skills with the ability to align technical execution with strategic mission objectives
• Strong organizational and program leadership skills, with the ability to manage multiple priorities and drive execution across parallel efforts

Qualifications

• Experience working with government customers, defense programs, or regulated environments is a strong plus
• Ability to obtain U.S. Security Clearance (Active clearance strongly preferred)

Benefits

• Mental health is just as important as physical health, so we provide quarterly wellness benefits
• Comprehensive health insurance for you and your family with 100% employee coverage
• 4% 401(k) matching to help employees invest in their future
• Quarterly 4-day company offsites

Pay and Schedule

• This is a hybrid role with 3 days in office. We aim to maximize the benefits of in-person collaboration while maintaining flexibility through a remote-friendly work environment.