As Manager, Environmental Control Systems & Thermal, you will directly lead and develop a team of individual contributors responsible for environmental control systems, aircraft thermal management, and associated fluid and heat-transfer hardware on the X-BAT program, while supporting the advancement of these capabilities across Group 5 programs. You will be accountable for team execution and people development while maintaining enough technical depth to guide architecture, requirements, design, integration, test, supplier execution, and flight readiness. This position requires a balance of direct people leadership, technical judgment, and hands-on engagement when needed in a fast-moving aircraft development environment. The ideal candidate is an experienced engineering manager who can set clear priorities, grow strong engineers, create a high technical bar, and help the team deliver meaningful capability to operators quickly.
What you'll do:
- People Leadership and Development: Manage, mentor, and develop individual contributors; set goals, give feedback, support growth, and build a high-trust, high-standard team.
- Team Planning and Execution: Set priorities, ownership, staffing, and execution cadence for X-BAT and Group 5 work; remove blockers and manage dependencies.
- Technical Direction and Review: Guide ECS and thermal architecture, trades, and design reviews across thermal environments, cooling, airflow, ducting, heat exchangers, fluid circuits, and related hardware.
- Requirements, Risk, and Maturity: Set expectations for requirements, reviews, verification, risk management, configuration control, and design release through flight-ready hardware.
- Vehicle Integration and Interfaces: Resolve interfaces with structures, propulsion, avionics, EWIS, payloads, manufacturing, systems engineering, and test teams.
- Test and Flight Readiness: Lead component, qualification, ground, and flight test planning; ensure data, anomaly resolution, and corrective actions support hardware delivery.
- Hardware and Suppliers: Set expectations for components, specifications, SOWs, supplier reviews, prototype builds, and acceptance activities.
- Hands-On Technical Leadership: Engage in first-principles analysis and root-cause investigations, coach engineers, and unblock complex technical problems.
- Communication and Accountability: Represent the team in program and engineering reviews; communicate decisions, risks, progress, resources, and dependencies.
Required qualifications:
- Clearance required: US Citizens Only & Must have an Active Secret or higher clearance.
- Experience: 8+ years in aerospace environmental control systems, thermal engineering, fluid systems, or comparable aircraft mechanical systems development.
- People Leadership: Experience directly managing and developing individual contributors, including setting expectations, giving feedback, and supporting career growth.
- Education: B.S. or M.S. in Mechanical Engineering, Aerospace Engineering, or a related technical discipline.
- Core Fundamentals: Deep understanding of thermodynamics, heat transfer, fluid dynamics, and aircraft thermal management.
- System Development Leadership: Ability to guide architecture, requirements, analysis, design, integration, and verification through hardware delivery.
- Technical Judgment and Communication: Sound engineering judgment, early risk identification, and clear communication across technical and program teams.
- Team Culture: Record of working hard, building trust, maintaining high standards, and treating others with kindness.
Preferred qualifications:
- Experience managing engineers on UAV, autonomous aircraft, fighter, tactical aircraft, or other high-performance aerospace programs.
- Experience with Group 5 aircraft, aircraft-level thermal management, ECS, or integrated fluid and thermal systems.
- Hands-on experience with thermal and fluid testing, instrumentation, data acquisition, model correlation, or flight-test troubleshooting.
- Experience with first-principles analysis, fluid-thermal network modeling, CFD, or thermal-analysis tools such as FloEFD, STAR-CCM+, Thermal Desktop, Amesim, or Flowmaster.
- Familiarity with aerospace environmental, qualification, and airworthiness practices, including MIL-STD-810, MIL-HDBK-516, RTCA DO-160, and SAE AIR or ARP standards.
- Experience with aerospace suppliers, COTS or custom components, technical specifications, SOWs, and prototype or vehicle-level test setups.
- Experience hiring, onboarding, and scaling a small engineering team in a rapid R&D or production environment.
- Advanced degree in Mechanical Engineering, Aerospace Engineering, or a related discipline.
Skills Required
- US citizenship and an active Secret or higher security clearance
- 8+ years of experience in aerospace environmental control systems, thermal engineering, fluid systems, or comparable aircraft mechanical systems development
- Direct experience managing and developing individual contributors
- B.S. or M.S. in Mechanical Engineering, Aerospace Engineering, or a related technical discipline
- Deep understanding of thermodynamics, heat transfer, fluid dynamics, and aircraft thermal management
- Ability to lead architecture, requirements, analysis, design, integration, and verification through hardware delivery
- Strong engineering judgment, risk identification, and technical communication skills
- Experience managing engineers on UAV, autonomous aircraft, fighter, tactical aircraft, or other high-performance aerospace programs
- Experience with Group 5 aircraft, aircraft-level thermal management, ECS, or integrated fluid and thermal systems
- Hands-on thermal and fluid testing, instrumentation, data acquisition, model correlation, or flight-test troubleshooting experience
- Experience with first-principles analysis, fluid-thermal network modeling, CFD, FloEFD, STAR-CCM+, Thermal Desktop, Amesim, or Flowmaster
- Familiarity with MIL-STD-810, MIL-HDBK-516, RTCA DO-160, and SAE AIR or ARP standards
- Experience with aerospace suppliers, technical specifications, SOWs, prototypes, or vehicle-level test setups
- Experience hiring, onboarding, and scaling an engineering team in a rapid R&D or production environment
- Advanced degree in Mechanical Engineering, Aerospace Engineering, or a related discipline
What the Team is Saying
Shield AI Compensation & Benefits Highlights
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Healthcare Strength — Company materials highlight comprehensive medical, dental, and vision coverage with mental-health support and an EAP. Third-party benefits summaries also portray health coverage as a strong component of the package.
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Retirement Support — Offerings include a 401(k) with employer matching, cited on the careers page and independent benefits directories. Multiple sources indicate a match exists, though exact formulas have varied over time and warrant confirmation.
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Equity Value & Accessibility — Company communications describe equity for all full-time hires and stock benefits as part of total rewards. Independent listings also note company equity/RSUs as a standard element.
Shield AI Insights
What We Do
At Shield AI, you won't wait years to see your work reach the field. You'll build hardware and software that operates in the real world right now, in the hands of the people who depend on it. Hivemind, our AI pilot, has been flying since 2018. It has flown more than 30 platforms, including an F-16, and it now sits under a U.S. Air Force production contract for Collaborative Combat Aircraft. When you write code or shape a system here, you contribute to technology with a proven flight record and a clear production future. V-BAT flies intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance missions with an operational record that stretches from Ukraine to the Indo-Pacific. It delivers eyes where they matter most, in the most demanding conditions on earth. The teams behind it watch their work get tested where the stakes are real. X-BAT takes its first flight this year. It's an AI-piloted fighter that needs no runway, built to operate where traditional aircraft can't. Join now and you help shape a program at its earliest, most formative stage. That's the kind of ground-floor work that defines a career. Do the most impactful work of your life, on problems that matter. Autonomy at this level asks a lot of you. You'll take on problems in perception, planning, and control that few teams anywhere are equipped to solve. You'll work across disciplines, from aerospace and robotics to machine learning and systems engineering, alongside people who hold themselves to an exacting standard and expect the same from you. Our mission is clear: protect service members and civilians with intelligent systems. That purpose runs through every decision, every design review, and every deployment. It's why the work here carries a weight you can feel. Ready to join our mission? Explore our open roles and find where you fit.
Why Work With Us
Founded in 2015 by a former Navy SEAL, Shield AI builds AI pilots and uncrewed aircraft. Veterans aren't an afterthought here, they're at every level. It's why the work carries weight: AI pilots and uncrewed aircraft flying real missions, from Ukraine to the Indo-Pacific, protecting service members and civilians.
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Employees engage in a combination of remote and on-site work.
