Thales is a global technology leader with more than 83,000 employees on five continents. With over 7,500 people in the UK, operating across defence, space, aerospace, and digital security, we help build a future we can all trust. Thales supports the security and stability of our nation by providing extraordinary technology to our customers, as well as delivering social value to the UK with our products and services.
Thales is a global technology leader with more than 83,000 employees on five continents. With over 7,500 people in the UK, operating across defence, space, aerospace, and digital security, we help build a future we can all trust. Thales supports the security and stability of our nation by providing extraordinary technology to our customers, as well as delivering social value to the UK with our products and services.
Optronics & Missile Electronics (OME)
We enable forces to gather timely, meaningful information so they can make thoughtful, decisive choices that safeguard communities. For more than 130 years, we’ve championed the development of Optronics for military, scientific and commercial applications. Our expertise covers three sectors: Air, Land and Sea.
An opportunity has arisen for a Lead Systems Engineer within Thales OME, the role is based in Glasgow and may require some travel and time spent at other Thales sites, Customer sites or integration and test facilities.
As a Lead Systems Engineer you will be responsible for leading the systems design activities throughout the engineering project lifecycle involving:
- Definition of the technical solution, including requirements elicitation and decomposition, and architecture from Operational Concepts through to Solution Architecture
- Definition, management and de-risking of the interfaces through and between the system functional chains
- Definition of the interfaces between the solution and the solution elements
- Upfront Integration, Validation, Verification and Qualification (IVVQ) activities to support the IVVQ Manager and supporting IVVQ throughout the lifecycle
- Design trades offs to establish an optimal design, ensuring that key design decisions are made, captured and communicated across all of the project stakeholders to meet the schedule demands
- Leading de-risk activities to explore solution designs and functionality, and to identify potential risk areas during IVVQ and sell-off
- Collaborating across all disciplines for the complete solution design, this includes:
- coherence of low level design to system design
- alignment of technical dependencies across the other disciplines and business areas
- understanding of technical assumptions and constraints
- identification of technical risks and their mitigations
- undertake workpackage management of key systems workpackages
The Lead Engineer will be the primary systems engineering interface to the Project Design Authority (PDA) and will maintain the overall system compliance to both the customer requirements and product line requirements.
The individual will be able to demonstrate the following to align to the Thales leadership behaviours model:
- A self-starter, with an ability to manage their own workload and meet their agreed objectives, whilst also contributing to the development and delivery of wider project goals
- Can master several co-engineering techniques to draw on multiple perspectives and sources to better understand and solve problems
- Proven ability to lead a team to pursue feasible solutions with respect to deadlines, cost and quality
- Able to provide real-time coaching to other systems engineers on the project to support their technical development
- Capable of collaborating and interfacing with various stakeholders, both internal and external, in order to ensure the cohesion of the solution design objectives
- Understand how to simplify and break down complex problems, prioritising design decisions and design collaboration
This role will report to the Head of Discipline for Systems Engineering and the Engineering Delivery Manager for their project.
Security Clearance Requirement:
Due to the nature of the work that we do at Thales, many of our roles are subject to security restrictions. This role requires Security Clearance (SC). It would be advantageous if currently held, however, if not currently held, it is a requirement that the successful applicant undergo, achieve, and maintain SC Clearance prior to commencing employment.
To be eligible for full SC, you generally need to have resided in the UK for the last 5 years. In some circumstances, a minimum of 3 years’ residence in the UK over the last 5 years may be accepted, with additional overseas checks.
Please visit the UKSV website for further guidance: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/united-kingdom-security-vetting-clearance-levels/national-security-vetting-clearance-levels.
Connect with Fiona Tal, Talent Acquisition Partner #LI-FT1 who is eager to explore together with you this exciting opportunity.
At Thales, we ensure equal opportunities, pay and working conditions for all. The benefits we offer include private medical insurance, buying or selling annual leave, cycle to work schemes, employee discounts, paid volunteering day, stocks and shares, annual bonus and much more depending on the role. Read more about our benefits here.
We are committed to creating a workplace where everyone feels valued for who they are and the unique strengths they bring. Discover more about our programmes, employee networks, wellbeing policies, and inclusive features here.
If this role isn’t quite right for you, we encourage you to join our talent community where your details will be shared with our recruitment teams for other potential opportunities.
Join the Talent Community here.
Join Thales in the UK – Innovate with us and shape the future!
At Thales, we ensure equal opportunities, pay and working conditions for all. The benefits we offer include private medical insurance, buying or selling annual leave, cycle to work schemes, employee discounts, paid volunteering day, stocks and shares, annual bonus and much more depending on the role. Read more about our benefits here.
We are committed to creating a workplace where everyone feels valued for who they are and the unique strengths they bring. Discover more about our programmes, employee networks, wellbeing policies, and inclusive features here.
If this role isn’t quite right for you, we encourage you to join our talent community where your details will be shared with our recruitment teams for other potential opportunities. Join the Talent Community here.
Join Thales in the UK – Innovate with us and shape the future!
Skills Required
- Demonstrated systems engineering experience covering requirements, architecture, interfaces, and the full engineering lifecycle.
- Experience supporting integration, verification, validation, qualification, and system sell-off activities.
- Ability to lead teams and systems engineering work packages while meeting schedule, cost, and quality objectives.
- Ability to coach systems engineers and collaborate with internal and external stakeholders.
- Ability to achieve and maintain UK Security Check (SC) clearance before commencing employment.
- Generally having resided in the UK for the last five years, with limited exceptions for three years of residence and additional overseas checks.
Thales Compensation & Benefits Highlights
The following summarizes recurring compensation and benefits themes identified from responses generated by popular LLMs to common candidate questions about Thales and has not been reviewed or approved by Thales.
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Retirement Support — Retirement plans with employer contributions and matches, profit sharing, and share purchase opportunities are emphasized across multiple regions. These elements are positioned as competitive components of total rewards.
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Leave & Time Off Breadth — Generous PTO that increases with tenure, paid holidays, and paid military, maternity, and paternity leave are described. This breadth supports work–life balance across locations.
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Flexible Benefits — Hybrid work options, flexible schedules, and parental supports such as childcare benefits and leave for sick children are available in several markets. Flexibility is presented as a core part of the employee experience.
Thales Insights
What We Do
Thales is a global high technology leader investing in digital and “deep tech” innovations – connectivity, big data, artificial intelligence, cybersecurity and quantum technology – to build a future we can all trust, which is vital to the development of our societies. The company provides solutions, services and products that help its customers – businesses, organisations and states – in the defence, aeronautics, space, transportation and digital identity and security markets to fulfil their critical missions, by placing humans at the heart of the decision-making process.
