Sr Principal Engineer Mission Operations – TS/SCI (Space/Satellite Systems)

At Northrop Grumman, our employees have incredible opportunities to work on revolutionary systems that impact people's lives around the world today, and for generations to come. Our pioneering and inventive spirit has enabled us to be at the forefront of many technological advancements in our nation's history - from the first flight across the Atlantic Ocean, to stealth bombers, to landing on the moon. We look for people who have bold new ideas, courage and a pioneering spirit to join forces to invent the future, and have fun along the way. Our culture thrives on intellectual curiosity, cognitive diversity and bringing your whole self to work — and we have an insatiable drive to do what others think is impossible. Our employees are not only part of history, they're making history.

Essential Functions:

This position is for a full-time technical role located in our Colorado Springs CO, Gilbert AZ or Dulles VA offices.  The successful candidate will be expected to:

• Provide mission operations support to NGSS Satellite programs. 

• Support system development activities such as requirements management, architecture development, integration and test and formal program milestones. 

• Work with systems engineers to develop operational documentation for use during on-orbit checkout and commissioning of satellites. 

• Conduct testing using simulators and resolve discrepancies. 

• Develop and test command procedures, telemetry pages, and other products derived from vendor provided documentation

• Develop test procedures and test execution for system level, end-to-end tests with the spacecraft.

• Support mission readiness activities including mission rehearsals, mission timeline development, and post launch test development.

• Support launch, including shift work, for instrument and spacecraft LEO&A activities.

• Monitor vehicle state of health across all subsystems.

• Perform short and long-term telemetry trending. 

• Track space vehicle configuration, to include both hardware, software, and configurable item parameters. 

• Support anomaly resolution efforts. 

• Make modifications to existing operations procedures to incorporate lessons learned from in-flight performance.  Develop new procedures as required. 

• Provide status reporting through both the functional and program reporting branches.

• Provide support to multiple programs.

• Maintain standards associated with the established Integrated/Developmental Operations functional group processes.

• Support internal and external customer meetings through proficient verbal and documented (MS PowerPoint, MS Word, MS Excel) communications .

• Will require some shift work, 25% or more of the time

Basic Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s Degree in engineering or related STEM discipline

• 9 years of related experience

• U.S. citizen

• Active or Current Top Secret /SCI security clearance required

• Prior experience conducting on-orbit mission operations or resolving satellite/ground system anomalies.

• Experience with at least one S/C Subsystem (ADCS/GNC, command and data handling, communications , power, Thermal, flight software, orbital planning and dynamics, etc.)

• System engineering experience or significant classwork in system engineering or system design

• Outstanding verbal and written communications skills, including ability to make persuasive presentations to external customers at milestone reviews

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience writing technical documents for internal or external customers

• Ability to work within a group of diversified individuals with varying backgrounds to achieve mission success.

• Support of readiness activities to include; Mission Readiness Tests (MRTs), Mission Rehearsals (MRs), Day In The Life (DITL) and daily operations testing.

• Experience with spacecraft launch campaigns

• Prior experience with virtualized deployment of LINUX based ground control software onto a ground system infrastructure

• Experience with MAESTRO command and control software

• Familiarity with training and certification programs for space system operators

• Experience working on government systems and/or government process environment

Salary Range for Gilbert AZ: $112,000-$158,000

Salary Range for Colorado Springs CO: $117,000-$166,000

Salary Range for Dulles VA: &129, 000 - $184000

This position reports to Dulles, VA, USA, however, you are able to work from any of the additional 2 locations listed above.

Salary Range: $112,000 USD - $184,000 USD

Employees may be eligible for a discretionary bonus in addition to base pay. Annual bonuses are designed to reward individual contributions as well as allow employees to share in company results. Employees in Vice President or Director positions may be eligible for Long Term Incentives. In addition, Northrop Grumman provides a variety of benefits including health insurance coverage, life and disability insurance, savings plan, Company paid holidays and paid time off (PTO) for vacation and/or personal business.

The health and safety of our employees and their families is a top priority. The company encourages employees to remain up-to-date on their COVID-19 vaccinations. U.S. Northrop Grumman employees may be required, in the future, to be vaccinated or have an approved disability/medical or religious accommodation, pursuant to future court decisions and/or government action on the currently stayed federal contractor vaccine mandate under Executive Order 14042 https://www.saferfederalworkforce.gov/contractors/.

Northrop Grumman is committed to hiring and retaining a diverse workforce. We are proud to be an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer, making decisions without regard to race, color, religion, creed, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status, national origin, age, veteran status, disability, or any other protected class. For our complete EEO/AA and Pay Transparency statement, please visit http://www.northropgrumman.com/EEO. U.S. Citizenship is required for most positions.