Senior Systems Engineering ​/ Deputy Project Systems Engineer

Job Summary

Serve as a Deputy Project Systems Engineer on a fast-paced delivery of Mars science payloads.

Serve as a Deputy Project Systems Engineer on a fast-paced delivery of Mars science payloads. Hiring of this position is pending award of an upcoming opportunity to deliver multiple science payloads to a Mars spacecraft to be launched in 2028. The Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (LASP) is seeking a talented and driven systems engineer to play a key role in the delivery of interplanetary payloads to enable ground-breaking Mars science.

As the Deputy Project Systems Engineer, you will work closely with the Lead Project Systems Engineer and payload teams to implement high-heritage LASP payload systems in a rapid concurrent engineering program on a partner institution's spacecraft. This is a rare opportunity to support the rapid deployment of science payloads from architecture formulation to space flight. Successful candidates are thrive in technically challenging environments, make sound engineering decisions with incomplete information, and know how to balance mission performance, cost, schedule, and risk to enable exceptional science.

CU is an Equal Opportunity Employer and complies with all applicable federal, state, and local laws governing nondiscrimination in employment. We are committed to creating a workplace where all individuals are treated with respect and dignity, and we encourage individuals from all backgrounds to apply, including protected veterans and individuals with disabilities.

LASP combines the agility of a university laboratory with the technical capability of a premier space mission organization. Engineers work directly alongside scientists, students, and mission operators, allowing technical decisions to move quickly while maintaining scientific excellence. As part of the University of Colorado Boulder (CU), LASP began in 1948 and is a world-recognized space science research institute that implements the full life cycle of science missions from the definition of the science questions through the development of space flight hardware and the subsequent mission operations.

We are the only research institute in the world to have sent science instruments to all eight planets, Pluto, and beyond the solar system. LASP combines all aspects of space exploration through our expertise in science, engineering, mission operations, and scientific data analysis. As part of CU, LASP also works to educate and train the next generation of space scientists, engineers and mission operators by integrating undergraduate and graduate students into working teams.

Our students take their unique experiences with them into government or industry or remain in academia to continue the cycle of exploration.

As the Deputy Project Systems engineer, you will work with the Lead Project Systems Engineer to carve out a role in the technical leadership and support of LASP payloads as well as management of the external interface between the LASP payloads and partner spacecraft. In the rapid concurrent engineering environment of this program, this role will heavily involve the management and tracking of design/interface/modeling assumptions and ensuring that engineering decisions made across payload subsystems remain aligned and consistent with the mission’s scientific objectives.

• Lead the identification and documentation of technical requirements
• Identify key system capabilities and performance requirements
• Create diagrams to show system structure and functional relationships
• Write and maintain technical documentation (deliverable and internal)
• Contribute to the system implementation approach and operational concept

• Assist the development of system architectures and interface definitions
• Identify key interface relationships and work with disciplinary specialists to define them
• Coordinate the development of interface control documents and supporting information
• Develops architectural guidelines for current and future system development

• Track proposed changes to a system to ensure that impacts are fully evaluated
• Evaluate the impacts of changes to interfacing systems and ensure that all impacted interfaces and designs are comprehensively assessed Technical Resource Management
  • Coordinate the allocation of mass, power, physical volume, and data volume to systems and subsystems
  • Trend and predict the usage of technical resources to identify allocation exceedances and support contingency planning when exceedances occur
  Project Processes
  • Lead the development of configuration management processes that comply with contractual and internal requirements
  • Ensure that configuration management processes are followed in the storage, review, and approval of internal and deliverable project documents
  • Lead risk management efforts in coordination with the project management office. Validate proposed…