Lead Systems Engineer; to Intelligence Community

Lead Systems Engineer

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The Systems and Operations Department (L626) within MITRE's Systems Engineering Division in the Center for Engineering and Analysis delivers innovative, mission-focused solutions using a multidisciplinary systems engineering approach to address sponsor challenges critical to national security missions. We advance engineering rigor, operational relevance, and mission effectiveness across complex systems and enterprises, with core focus areas in Domain Systems Engineering, Lifecycle Systems Engineering, and Acquisition Systems Engineering.

Our teams develop, assess, and transition engineering solutions, provide strategic technical vision, and deliver data-informed recommendations that enable sponsor mission success from tactical through enterprise levels.

Roles & Responsibilities:

• Apply systems engineering principles across the system development lifecycle, including mission analysis, concept development, system design, architecture definition, requirements development, integration, verification, validation, deployment planning, and technical transition
• Lead or support system design and architecture activities by translating sponsor mission needs, operational constraints, and capability gaps into system concepts, functional designs, technical approaches, and implementation options
• Develop, assess, and refine system architectures for complex mission systems, including operational views, functional architectures, logical and physical architectures, interfaces, data flows, dependencies, and integration points
• Apply Traditional Systems Engineering (TSE) and Model-Based Systems Engineering (MBSE) methods to capture system behavior, structure, requirements, interfaces, constraints, verification relationships, trade space, risks, and technical decisions
• Conduct stakeholder engagements, workshops, interviews, and technical working groups to elicit, analyze, document, and validate clear, testable, and traceable mission, system, product, interface, performance, security, and operational requirements
• Conduct engineering studies, trade analyses, and gap assessments to evaluate current-state systems, operational processes, technology limitations, interoperability challenges, and opportunities to improve mission outcomes
• Support integration, test, verification, validation, deployment planning, and technical transition activities for complex systems, including integration sequencing, test objectives, success criteria, interface dependencies, and deployment readiness considerations
• Advise government sponsors and program managers on mission context, capability needs, technical priorities, system roadmaps, technology insertion opportunities, acquisition strategies, and engineering approaches that support program objectives
• Support acquisition planning and execution by contributing to Statements of Work, Statements of Objectives, Performance Work Statements, market research, acquisition strategies, evaluation criteria, technical evaluation plans, source selection documentation, and vendor assessments
• Collaborate with multidisciplinary teams to develop and present technical artifacts, architecture briefings, decision papers, trade study results, requirements packages, interface documentation, and engineering recommendations for sponsor and leadership review
• Serve as a mentor to junior staff by providing guidance, feedback, and knowledge-sharing to support their professional growth and strengthen team capabilities

Basic Qualifications:

• Minimum of 8 years of related experience with a Bachelor's degree; or 6 years and a Master's degree; or a PhD with 3 years' experience; or equivalent combination of related education and work experience
• Experience applying systems engineering practices to complex technical, operational, or mission-focused systems
• Experience with system design, system architecture modeling, requirements development, interface analysis, integration planning,…