At Shield AI, we are revolutionizing defense technology with AI-powered autonomous systems. As a Technical Program Manager, you will lead the integrated execution of complex autonomy-enabled UAS programs from requirements through deployment. You will combine systems-engineering rigor with program-management discipline and scaled-Agile leadership to align multiple engineering teams, manage technical and delivery risk, and deliver verified capability to customers.
This role is ideal for a technically credible leader with deep experience in system integration, requirements management, verification and test, integrated planning, and cross-functional execution. You will establish the plans, operating cadence, technical visibility, and decision mechanisms that enable teams to deliver high-impact mission capability predictably.
What you'll do:
- Lead end-to-end execution of complex UAS, autonomy, mission-system, or customer-delivery programs, achieving technical, schedule, cost, quality, and customer objectives.
- Own integrated program plans, including scope, milestones, schedules, critical path, resource needs, dependencies, risks, issues, decisions, and change control.
- Partner with technical leads to ensure requirements, interfaces, verification plans, test readiness, technical baselines, and customer acceptance criteria are clear, measurable, and traceable.
- Lead cross-functional system integration and test execution across hardware, software, autonomy, systems engineering, test, manufacturing, flight operations, cybersecurity, and field/customer teams.
- Drive timely resolution of technical, programmatic, and cross-team issues; facilitate trade studies, risk mitigations, recovery plans, and leadership decisions when needed.
- Establish and lead an effective multi-team delivery cadence, including integrated planning, dependency reviews, program execution reviews, system demonstrations, release-readiness reviews, and continuous-improvement activities.
- Coordinate delivery across multiple engineering teams, releases, and customer commitments; identify and remove systemic blockers that affect integrated capability delivery.
- Communicate technical status, risks, tradeoffs, decisions, and delivery outlook clearly to engineering leadership, executives, customers, and external stakeholders.
- Develop and use program metrics and dashboards to improve execution predictability, integration readiness, requirements-verification status, risk posture, and release performance.
- Mentor project engineers and technical leads in integrated planning, systems-engineering execution, risk management, and cross-functional delivery practices.
Required qualifications:
- Bachelor’s degree in Aerospace Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Systems Engineering, Computer Science, Physics, or a related STEM discipline.
- Typically 8–12+ years of experience in systems engineering, project engineering, technical program management, aerospace, defense, robotics, autonomy, UAS, or a similarly complex technical environment.
- Demonstrated experience leading cross-functional technical programs involving multiple engineering disciplines and delivering integrated products, capabilities, or customer solutions.
- Strong systems-engineering experience, including requirements management, traceability, interface management, system integration, verification and validation, test planning/execution, and configuration or technical-baseline management.
- Proven program-management capability, including integrated planning and scheduling, scope management, resource coordination, risk and issue management, stakeholder communication, and execution reporting.
- Experience coordinating multiple Agile teams or technical workstreams toward shared releases, demonstrations, system-level milestones, or customer deliveries.
- Strong written, verbal, and executive communication skills, with the ability to explain technical status, risks, and tradeoffs to both technical and non-technical stakeholders.
- Ability to obtain and maintain a DoD security clearance.
- Willingness to travel up to 25%.
Preferred qualifications:
- Active DoD security clearance.
- PMP certification, INCOSE certification, SAFe Release Train Engineer certification, or equivalent demonstrated experience in technical program, systems-engineering, or scaled-Agile leadership.
- Experience serving as a Technical Program Manager, Release Train Engineer, Integrated Product Team lead, Project Engineer, systems-integration lead, or comparable cross-functional technical leadership role.
- Experience facilitating multi-team planning, dependency management, program execution reviews, system demonstrations, release-readiness reviews, and continuous-improvement activities.
- Experience with Jira, Confluence, Jira Align, Microsoft Project, Smartsheet, Azure DevOps, Jama, Polarion, DOORS, Cameo, or comparable planning, requirements, and systems-engineering tools.
- Experience with UAS, autonomy, robotics, AI-enabled systems, mission systems, sensors, payloads, communications/datalinks, SATCOM, navigation, flight test, or fielded defense systems.
- Experience supporting DoD, intelligence-community, aviation, maritime, international-defense, or other mission-critical customer programs.
- Experience with manufacturing, production readiness, supplier coordination, cybersecurity, airworthiness/clearance-to-fly, configuration management, export compliance, or field deployment.
Skills Required
- Bachelor's degree in Aerospace Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Systems Engineering, Computer Science, Physics, or a related STEM discipline.
- Typically 8-12+ years of experience in systems engineering, project engineering, technical program management, aerospace, defense, robotics, autonomy, UAS, or a similarly complex technical environment.
- Experience leading cross-functional technical programs involving multiple engineering disciplines and delivering integrated products, capabilities, or customer solutions.
- Strong systems-engineering experience, including requirements management, traceability, interface management, system integration, verification and validation, test planning and execution, and configuration or technical-baseline management.
- Program-management experience including integrated planning and scheduling, scope management, resource coordination, risk and issue management, stakeholder communication, and execution reporting.
- Experience coordinating multiple Agile teams or technical workstreams toward shared releases, demonstrations, system-level milestones, or customer deliveries.
- Strong written, verbal, and executive communication skills.
- Ability to obtain and maintain a DoD security clearance.
- Willingness to travel up to 25%.
- Active DoD security clearance.
- PMP certification, INCOSE certification, SAFe Release Train Engineer certification, or equivalent demonstrated experience.
- Experience as a Technical Program Manager, Release Train Engineer, Integrated Product Team lead, Project Engineer, systems-integration lead, or comparable technical leadership role.
- Experience with UAS, autonomy, robotics, AI-enabled systems, mission systems, sensors, payloads, communications or datalinks, SATCOM, navigation, flight test, or fielded defense systems.
- Experience supporting DoD, intelligence-community, aviation, maritime, international-defense, or other mission-critical customer programs.
- Experience with manufacturing, production readiness, supplier coordination, cybersecurity, airworthiness, configuration management, export compliance, or field deployment.
What the Team is Saying
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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Hybrid Workspace
Employees engage in a combination of remote and on-site work.
