[Hiring] Director, Features System Engineering @Merlin Labs

Role Description

You are a systems engineering Technology leader who has built and run the function strategically, not just practiced it. You have partnered with business and product teams to lead the system and sub-system expectations, requirements, and verification strategy on new product development programs, and you know how to turn an ambiguous concept into a defined, testable, certifiable system. You have defined the behaviors and functions of autonomous, AI-enabled systems, ideally in Product Architecture, Mission Autonomy, Vehicle Autonomy, and you can coach, explain and drive the design intent and the safety case to engineers, executives, customers, suppliers, and regulators with equal credibility.

You have worked as part of an engineering and technology organization on safety-critical systems, so you know how to keep safety and human factors at the forefront while the schedule is pushing hard. You set the systems engineering plans, processes, and standards that let a small, fast-moving team execute without losing rigor, and you stay close enough to the work to own significant architecture, requirements, and interface decisions yourself. You align hardware, software, safety, and flight controls around a shared technical picture, and you hold the line when disciplines disagree.

You build and develop managers and engineers as readily as you build architectures. You hire strong systems talent, mentor them into technical leaders, and earn trust across engineering through judgment rather than title. You are drawn to the hardest version of this problem: bringing autonomy to certified commercial and military aviation, where the technology is new, the stakes are real, and the playbook is still being written.

Responsibilities

• Own Merlin’s feature systems engineering development roadmap, strategy, processes, and standards, and evolve them as the program moves from early development toward certification.
• Lead and manage systems engineering tasking across the organization, aligning hardware, software, safety, and flight controls disciplines to deliver on a shared technical plan and schedule.
• Set the technical direction for concepts of operation, functional and physical system architecture, and system interfaces across Merlin products, and personally own the most critical architecture decisions.
• Define the features, functions, and autonomous behaviors that each sub-system must execute, and ensure they trace cleanly to system-level requirements and the safety case.
• Lead the Safety, Security and Human factors teams to keep them at the forefront of architecture and requirements decisions without slowing the pace of development.
• Partner closely with Core Architecture and Chief engineer organizations to drive engineering strategy and execution.
• Represent Merlin’s systems engineering artifacts, including requirements, architecture, and interface definitions, in reviews with customers, suppliers, and regulatory authorities.
• Build, hire, and develop the systems engineering team, setting clear expectations, mentoring technical leads, and growing the bench as the company scales.
• Collaborate with executive leadership, program leads, and engineering functions to prioritize systems engineering work and communicate technical risk, status, and tradeoffs clearly.
• Own System and sub-system-level requirements, including their development, validation, and traceability, and hold the quality bar on requirements across every discipline.
• Lead the tech strategy on definition of test methods and testing strategies at the sub-system and system level, and lead verification and validation activities from simulation and ground test through flight test.

Qualifications

• BS in Electrical, Aerospace, Systems Engineering, or a related field; MS or PhD preferred.
• 15+ years of systems engineering experience (10+ with an MS, 8+ with a PhD), including at least 4 years being a manager of System engineering managers.
• Specific experience in Mission Autonomy and Vehicle Autonomy development, including aspects of AI in autonomy system engineering.
• Demonstrated ability to define system-level requirements, architecture, and interfaces, and to drive the teams on requirements validation and verification through to system-level confidence.
• Proven record of solving complex architectural and systems engineering problems on new product development programs.
• Experience working in an early stage R&D department on safety-critical systems or sub-systems, with sound judgment about when to move fast and when to hold the line.
• Experience with requirements management tools and processes best practices and with establishing them for a growing team.
• Hands-on experience certifying avionics equipment using ARP4754A and RTCA DO-178B/C and DO-254 for safety-critical systems.
• Track record of collaborating across engineering domains, customers, suppliers, and partners, and of earning credibility with technical teams and senior stakeholders.
• Experienced in hiring, developing, and retaining strong systems engineering talent and leadership coaching.
• Demonstration of development and deployment of writing SE processes for the business and teams.
• Comfortable working with the leading AI based tools and frameworks and implementing best practices to automate System engineering deliverables and processes.
• Experience in developing, executing and monitoring Agile framework based System level releases using tools like Jira.

Nice to Have

• Working knowledge of ARP4761A and MIL-STD-882E.
• Experience leading systems engineering in FAA, EASA, DoD airworthiness experience (e.g., MIL-HDBK-516), DoD certification programs, including direct interaction with certification authorities.
• Specific experience in automatic flight controls, flight management, or display systems.
• Experience developing software requirements and overseeing software verification.
• Working knowledge of FAA, EASA, and DoD regulations and standards.
• Working knowledge of model-based systems engineering (MBSE), and experience introducing it to a team.
• Familiarity with Simulink, Cameo, IADS, and Jama.
• Experience building a systems engineering function at an early-stage or high-growth company.

Benefits

• Highly competitive equity grants are considered part of Merlin's total compensation package.
• Top-tier benefits for full-time employees, including health, dental, life, flexible paid time off, and 401k with match.
• Work/life integration.
• Support for professional development while working together to achieve our mission.