Senior Manager, Systems & Test Engineering and Labs

About the role

The Senior Manager, Systems & Test Engineering and Labs provides unified leadership over Systems Engineering, Test Engineering, and Lab Operations. This leader ensures disciplined engineering execution driven by robust system engineering practices, rigorous test practices, and safe, standardized lab operations.

Responsibilities

• Lead Systems and Test Engineering teams responsible for requirements, architecture, integration, and verification/validation.
• Lead the System Engineering discipline across requirements development, architecture, design, integration and verification – consistent with ESA’s Model-Based Systems Engineering (MBSE) frameworks and technical baseline governance.
• Create, implement and enforce sound standards, grounded in industry best practices, for test execution across multiple disciplines in support of night vision devices and related sensors.
• Ensure compliance with regulated industry standards.
• Oversee engineering plans, schedules, and deliverables.
• Oversee daily R&D Engineering lab operations including 6S, calibration, configuration control, and safety compliance.
• Manages Lab Supervisor and ensure coordinated lab activity in support of both R&D Engineering and internal customer needs.
• Promote cross-functional collaboration across engineering disciplines and with internal customers.
• Apply lean principles and continuous improvement.
• Enforce consistent engineering standards and operational discipline.
• Lead the team through coaching, mentoring and performance management.
• Develop skills matrices, succession paths and training plans for Systems, Test and Lab roles.
• Drive a continuous improvement mindset within the group.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in engineering.
• 5 years industry experience applying Systems & Test Engineering practices in a regulated, high-technology environment.
• 5 years proven engineering leadership experience, managing engineers and technicians.
• Strong experience with requirements management, verification planning, system architecture and technical baseline management.
• Familiarity with MBSE, architecture modeling and model-driven verification.
• Experience with test development, optical/electro-optical system testing, data analysis and engineering reports.
• On-site availability in Roanoke.