Systems Engineering Manager

Instant Connect Enterprise™ (ICE ) is a push-to-talk platform that connects incompatible radio networks, mobile devices, satellite links, and command infrastructure into unified talk channels over IP. Hardware-agnostic by design, ICE runs on any standard device or OS and is engineered to operate in DDIL (Denied, Degraded, Intermittent, and Limited-bandwidth) environments.

ICE is the official voice engine of the U.S. Army and the special operations forces of five allied nations. Certified by the U.S. Joint Interoperability Test Command (JITC) and approved for use on the DoD Information Network, it is in active use across more than 58 countries.

Instant Connect Software LLC is an affiliated company of the Dillon Kane Group (), a Chicago-based technology firm serving defense, government, and commercial markets since 2002.

Location: Chicago, IL or Remote
Start: Immediate
Duration: Full-time employee, long term
Clearance: Active U.S. DoD Top Secret Clearance (required)
Citizenship: U.S. citizen (required)

We’re hiring a System Engineering Manager to lead both our pre-sales engineering team and our post-sales technical support organization. The role covers the full customer technical lifecycle — from initial evaluation and proposal through implementation and ongoing support — with direct accountability for SLA performance across DoD and commercial accounts. This position can be performed remotely.

Note:
In compliance with federal law, all persons hired will be required to verify identity and eligibility to work in the United States and to complete the required employment eligibility verification form upon hire.

• Lead, mentor, and manage the Pre-Sales System Engineering team supporting Radio over IP and Voice over IP solutions.
• Manage the post-sales technical support team providing Level 1–4 support in accordance with Instant Connect’s Technical Support Service (TSS) commitments.
• Own accountability for all SLA performance metrics including response time objectives:
  • Critical and High severity: initial response within 15 minutes
  • Medium and Low severity: initial response within 1 hour
• Oversee and enforce the Support Escalation Policy for both commercial and DoD customers, managing escalation paths up to VP and CEO level as required.
• Manage and optimize the DoD support workflow in JIRA (DOD project), ensuring ticket quality, accurate priority assignment, and proper data hygiene for workforce planning.
• Serve as the TAC (Technical Assistance Center) Duty Manager for high-priority escalations.
• Develop staffing models based on JIRA work log data, support ticket volume, and SLA performance trends.
• Coordinate with Sales leadership to allocate pre-sales engineering resources across active opportunities.
• Drive continuous improvement of support processes, documentation, and tooling.

• Manage all aspects of DoD support delivery under the separate JIRA DoD Support project, ensuring data isolation and compliance requirements are met.
• Ensure all support personnel engaging with DoD tickets are US citizens and cleared to the appropriate level.
• Monitor and enforce the DoD-specific escalation matrix including timely alert of ice-dod-incident-support, DoD lead, and senior management per elapsed time thresholds.
• Maintain readiness to support thousands of nodes in high-tempo, volatile production environments (e.g., C3T kits in tactical deployments).
• Ensure accurate labeling and tracking of DoD tickets including kit identification (e.g., TRIK numbers), License Issued events, and Upgrade activities.
• Support preparation for security‑based criteria changes that may require further isolation of support data from non‑US citizens.
• Familiarity with and ability to manage compliance…