Posted:
1/8/2026, 12:03:49 AM
Location(s):
Huntsville, Alabama, United States ⋅ Alabama, United States
Experience Level(s):
Expert or higher ⋅ Mid Level ⋅ Senior
Field(s):
IT & Security
Workplace Type:
On-site
Northrop Grumman Space Systems – Launch and Missile Defense Systems has an exciting career opportunity for a Principal Systems Engineer / Product Owner to join our team of qualified, diverse individuals. This position will be located in Huntsville, AL.
Position Overview:
The selected Principal Systems Engineer / Product Owner will work on the Modeling and Simulation – Framework (MASC-F) program with a multidisciplinary team of engineers and developers. As an Agile Product Owner, the Systems Engineer will split efforts between technical contributions and responsibility of maximizing the value of the products created by a scrum development team. The product owner will serve as the customer proxy responsible for working with the Customer and other stakeholders—including other POs—to define and prioritize stories in the team backlog. This role holds the vision of what product or service needs to be developed and conveys that vision to the scrum team.
Essential Functions:
Analyzing requirements via Interface Design Documents and translating these into technical specifications.
Designing, implementing, and maintaining systems or software to meet customer needs.
Provide technical contributions towards software products, processes, and procedures.
Collaborating with stakeholders to ensure system integration and performance.
Defining and Communicating the vision: Serve as the point person on a product development team, using high-level perspective to define goals and create a vision for development projects. Communicate with stakeholders across the board, including customers, business area POCs, and the development team to make sure the goals are clear, and the vision is aligned with business objectives.
Managing the product backlog: Responsible for managing the product backlog—the development team’s project to-do list. This includes: creating the list of backlog items and prioritize them on the overall strategy and business objectives; mapping out project dependencies to inform the necessary sequence of development.
Prioritizing needs: Responsible for prioritizing needs base on scope, time, and objectives of stakeholders.
Overseeing development stages: Responsible for overseeing the actual development of the product, playing a key role throughout each event, including planning, refinement, review, and sprint.
Acting as primary liaison: This role will serve as the primary communicator and link between stakeholders and teams.
Evaluating product progress at each iteration: Accountable for each stage of the development process and the final product. Play a primary role in inspecting and evaluating product progress through each iteration.
The selected candidate should thrive in a fast-paced work environment with high expectations, significantly diverse assignments, collaborative/team settings across all levels.
Basic Qualifications for a Principal Systems Engineer are:
Bachelor’s Degree in a STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering or Mathematics) discipline preferred from an accredited university and 5 years of related experience, or a Master's Degree and 3 years of related experience, or 0 years of experience with a PhD.
Experience with Red Hat Enterprise Linux OS
Python experience or similar technology.
Have MDA system exposure experience.
Experience with Jupyter Notes or similar technology.
Proven communication skills (verbal and written) with a demonstrated ability to communicate at all levels (up/down/parallel)
Proven ability to build collaboration across organizations
Ability to interact effectively with and lead diverse teams
Full time onsite
A current active in-scope U.S. Government DoD Secret security clearance.
Preferred Qualifications:
Ballistic Missile Defense System (BMDS) domain experience (Long Range Discriminating Radar (LRDR), Aegis BMD, Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD), C2BMC, AN/TPY-2, SBX, THAAD, Patriot, SBIRS, etc.)
Agile Product Owner experience
Interface experience (knowledge of the phenomenology transferred to elements, at least GTISS knowledge)
Able to do technical briefing at high levels
Familiarity with BMD tech baseline products (E.g. BMD SDD, BMD SS), processes, and content
Experience developing performance requirements
Demonstrated project and team leadership experience
Proficiency with DOORS
Proficiency with an architecture modeling tool (e.g. System Architect, Rhapsody, Magic Draw)
Agile certifications (e.g. Product Owner, Scrum Master, SAFe, etc.)
Current active in-scope U.S. Government DoD Top Secret security clearance.
Website: https://northropgrumman.com/
Headquarter Location: Falls Church, Virginia, United States
Employee Count: 10001+
Year Founded: 1994
IPO Status: Public
Last Funding Type: Grant
Industries: Data Integration ⋅ Manufacturing ⋅ Remote Sensing ⋅ Security ⋅ Software