Northrop Grumman Mission Systems is a trusted provider of mission-enabling solutions for global security. Our Engineering and Sciences (E&S) organization pushes the boundaries of innovation, redefines engineering capabilities, and drives advances in various sciences. Our team is chartered with providing the skills, innovative technologies to develop, design, produce and sustain optimized product lines across the sector while providing a decisive advantage to the warfighter. Come be a part of our mission!
Northrop Grumman Corporation is offering a challenging and rewarding career as a Principal/Sr. Principal Digital Electrical Engineer within the Mission Systems Sector located at the Rolling Meadows - Illinois facility.
The Principal/Sr. Principal Digital Engineer role involves full life-cycle product development from system concepts and requirements through design, production, verification, and field support while working in integrated product teams spanning Engineering, Manufacturing, and Program Management. Digital subsystem and circuit card designs utilize the latest FPGA technologies from all major vendors and device families including Xilinx, Altera, and Actel, and support high speed interfaces, Radio Frequency (RF) and Electro-Optical (EO) DSP, controls, data links, embedded processing and interfaces.
Job Description:
As a Principal/Sr. Principal Digital Electrical Engineer, you will join our diverse team and be responsible for research, design, and development of digital hardware products. Your expertise in digital component design and analysis, modeling and simulation, and circuit level design and test are desired for this position.
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This position will be full-time and on-site at our Rolling Meadows, IL. Location
This position can be filled at the Principal or Sr. Principal level based on requirements below
Basic Qualifications Principal Digital Design Engineer
- Bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering or similar engineering discipline with a minimum 5 years of digital electronics design experience or 3 years of digital electronics design experience with a Master's degree in a technical field.
- Digital circuit design experience, including simulation & schematic capture through test and integration
- Hands-on prototyping and debug experience testing complex digital subsystems, such as complex circuit card development involving FPGAs, and/or embedded processors, and/or high-speed interfaces
- Demonstrated ability to translate system performance and operational specifications into hardware requirements, design, and test specifications
- Familiarity with documentation, revision control and review systems similar to DOORS, ClearCase, and ClearQuest
- US Citizen
- Ability to obtain and maintain a DoD Secret security clearance
Basic Qualifications for a Sr. Principal Digital Engineer
- Bachelors’ degree in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering or similar engineering discipline with a minimum 8 years of digital electronics design experience or 6 years of digital electronics design experience with a Master's degree in a technical field.
- Digital circuit design experience, including simulation & schematic capture through test and integration
- Hands-on prototyping and debug experience testing complex digital subsystems, such as complex circuit card development involving FPGAs, and/or embedded processors, and/or high-speed interfaces
- Demonstrated ability to translate system performance and operational specifications into hardware requirements, design, and test specifications
- Familiarity with documentation, revision control and review systems like DOORS, ClearCase, and ClearQuest
- US Citizen
- Ability to obtain and maintain a DoD Secret security clearance
Preferred Qualifications:
- An advanced degree in Electrical or Computer Engineering with a minimum 12 years of digital electronics design experience
- Working knowledge of Electronic Warfare systems
- Recent circuit card design experience utilizing circuit-related tools including Cadence Concept, Allegro, and/or Mentor DxDesigner, Expedition
- Working experience with ClearCase/ClearQuest and DOORS
- Proven skills to include team leadership, communicating with all levels of an organization internally and externally, adaptable, creative, collaborative and comfortable working independently and enjoys solving difficult problems
- Current Secret or Top-Secret Security Clearance
Skills Required
- Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering or similar with minimum 5 years digital electronics design experience (or 3 years with Master's).
- Bachelors degree with minimum 8 years digital electronics design experience (or 6 years with Master's) for Sr. Principal level.
- Digital circuit design experience, including simulation and schematic capture through test and integration.
- Hands-on prototyping and debug experience with complex digital subsystems (FPGAs, embedded processors, high-speed interfaces).
- Demonstrated ability to translate system performance and operational specifications into hardware, design, and test specifications.
- Familiarity with documentation and revision control systems such as DOORS, ClearCase, and ClearQuest.
- U.S. Citizenship.
- Ability to obtain and maintain a DoD Secret security clearance.
- Advanced degree in Electrical or Computer Engineering with extensive (12+ years) digital electronics design experience.
- Working knowledge of Electronic Warfare systems.
- Recent circuit card design experience using Cadence Concept, Allegro, Mentor DxDesigner, and/or Expedition.
- Current Secret or Top-Secret security clearance.
- Proven team leadership, strong communication skills, adaptability, and problem-solving ability.
Northrop Grumman Compensation & Benefits Highlights
The following summarizes recurring compensation and benefits themes identified from responses generated by popular LLMs to common candidate questions about Northrop Grumman and has not been reviewed or approved by Northrop Grumman.
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Retirement Support — 401(k) matching is considered strong, with additional defined-benefit coverage for certain cohorts and options like catch-up contributions. Retirement programs are repeatedly highlighted as a core strength of the total rewards.
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Leave & Time Off Breadth — PTO, company-paid holidays, and compressed work schedules (such as 9/80) provide meaningful time away and flexibility. These scheduling options are cited as a major quality-of-life benefit across many locations.
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Parental & Family Support — Paid parental leave alongside caregiver leave, adoption assistance, and back-up care supports a range of family needs. These programs have been expanded recently, signaling continued investment in family support.
Northrop Grumman Insights
What We Do
We are a close-knit community of big thinkers collaborating to keep the world safe. Our passion, creativity and expertise bring next-level technology solutions to life in autonomous systems, cyber, C4ISR, strike, space, and logistics and modernization for our customers around the globe. On the Northrop Grumman team, you’ll join our pursuit of excellence immersed in a dynamic culture of innovation and respect. Your unique perspective will help achieve our shared vision for the future of global security. Every step of the way, you'll be supported by world-class training, employee resource groups and a comprehensive benefits package that enables greater health and happiness for you and your family. Worldwide and across disciplines, we’re challenging what’s possible for technology to protect people and places from undersea to outer space and into cyberspace. And we see the impact of our performance every day. We are Northrop Grumman, and we work on what matters—now, you too can make a difference. Explore opportunities in engineering, IT, manufacturing, business management, cybersecurity and more with us. Northrop Grumman is committed to hiring and retaining a diverse workforce. We are proud to be an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer.
