Systems Engineer

Actalent; Ottawa; Hybrid; CAD 62,000 - 77,000; Full time

Job summary

Actalent is seeking a Systems Engineer – Requirements to deliver high-quality requirements for large naval programs in Canada’s defence sector. You will join a dedicated Requirements Management team supporting the Royal Canadian Navy fleet across platforms.

You will capture, analyze, and maintain contractual, technical, and regulatory requirements with government stakeholders and cross‑functional teams to ensure readiness and compliant systems.

Qualifications

• 5+ years of experience in design and integration of complex systems in commercial and/or military domains.
• 3+ years focusing on requirements engineering activities.
• 4+ years in naval, aerospace, or defence industry working on complex systems.
• 3+ years as a Systems Engineer specializing in requirements engineering.
• Experience in requirements definition, analysis, and writing.
• Knowledge of configuration management for requirements change, baseline management, and traceability.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills for documenting requirements and leading reviews.

Responsibilities

• Elicit, analyze, and document system, subsystem, and interface requirements for complex naval and defence systems.
• Collaborate with government and engineering teams to reflect operational needs and constraints.
• Ensure requirements are unambiguous, feasible, testable, and verifiable.
• Develop and maintain comprehensive requirements specifications and artefacts.
• Establish and maintain bidirectional traceability between requirements and architecture, design, verification, and validation artefacts.
• Plan and participate in formal requirements reviews, walkthroughs, and sign-off activities.
• Review proposed requirement changes and support change and baseline management.
• Assist SMEs in producing high-quality, detailed requirements and artefacts.

Skills

Systems integration

Requirements engineering

Traceability

Stakeholder collaboration

Configuration management

Analytical skills

Written and verbal communication

Education

Post-secondary education in systems engineering

Tools

IBM DOORS

Polarion

DXL scripting

REST APIs

XML/ReqIF

Python

Job description

Job Title: Systems Engineer – Requirements

This Systems Engineer – Requirements role focuses on delivering high‑quality requirements engineering for large‑scale naval programs within Canada’s defence and security sector. You will join a dedicated Requirements Management team that supports the Royal Canadian Navy fleet by enabling preventive and corrective maintenance, integrated logistics support, and new capability insertion across multiple platforms. In this position, you will collaborate with government stakeholders, defence organizations, and integrated engineering project teams to capture, analyze, and maintain contractual, technical, and regulatory requirements throughout the vessel support lifecycle. You will gain hands‑on experience with complex naval systems while helping shape requirements that directly influence fleet readiness and operational capability, ensuring systems are truly fit for purpose and not just technically compliant.

Job Title: Systems Engineer – Requirements

Job Description

This Systems Engineer – Requirements role focuses on delivering high‑quality requirements engineering for large‑scale naval programs within Canada’s defence and security sector. You will join a dedicated Requirements Management team that supports the Royal Canadian Navy fleet by enabling preventive and corrective maintenance, integrated logistics support, and new capability insertion across multiple platforms. In this position, you will collaborate with government stakeholders, defence organizations, and integrated engineering project teams to capture, analyze, and maintain contractual, technical, and regulatory requirements throughout the vessel support lifecycle. You will gain hands‑on experience with complex naval systems while helping shape requirements that directly influence fleet readiness and operational capability, ensuring systems are truly fit for purpose and not just technically compliant.

Responsibilities

• Elicit, analyze, and document system, subsystem, and interface requirements for complex naval and defence systems.
• Collaborate closely with stakeholders, including government and engineering teams, to ensure requirements and related work products reflect agreed operational needs, constraints, and stakeholder concerns.
• Ensure all requirements are unambiguous, feasible, testable, and verifiable, and align with end‑user needs and system concepts of employment.
• Develop and maintain comprehensive requirements specifications and related artefacts within a requirements management tool.
• Establish and maintain bidirectional traceability between requirements and architecture, design, verification, and validation artefacts.
• Perform and review requirements decomposition, including coverage and gap analysis, to confirm that system and subsystem requirements are complete and coherent.
• Plan and participate in formal requirements reviews, walkthroughs, and sign‑off activities with engineering teams and customer representatives.
• Review proposed requirement changes, assess associated impact analysis, and support requirements change and baseline management activities in accordance with configuration management processes.
• Support requirements baseline management and configuration control activities, ensuring changes are properly documented, analyzed, and approved.
• Assist subject matter experts in producing high‑quality, detailed requirements and related engineering artefacts that support system design, integration, and verification.
• Apply established systems engineering processes and tools to maintain high standards of requirements quality throughout the system lifecycle.
• Contribute to enterprise‑wide requirements visibility and audit‑ready compliance documentation to support performance incentive achievement and program success.

Essential Skills

• At least 5 years of professional experience in the design and integration of complex systems in commercial and/or military domains.
• At least 3 years of professional experience with a primary focus on requirements engineering activities.
• 4+ years of experience within the naval, aerospace, or defence industry working on complex systems.
• 3+ years of experience as a Systems Engineer specializing in requirements engineering.
• Proven experience in systems engineering, including requirements definition, requirements analysis, and requirements writing.
• Demonstrated ability to develop, document, and maintain system, subsystem, and interface requirements throughout the system lifecycle.
• Strong understanding of requirements development processes for naval systems or other complex defence or aerospace platforms.
• Ability to ensure requirements are unambiguous, feasible, testable, and verifiable, and aligned with operational needs and constraints.
• Experience working with integrated project teams and stakeholders to capture and refine technical and operational requirements.
• Knowledge of configuration management principles related to requirements change, baseline management, and traceability.
• Strong analytical skills for performing requirements decomposition, coverage analysis, and gap identification.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills for documenting requirements and leading or participating in formal reviews.

Additional Skills & Qualifications

• Experience with requirements management tools such as IBM DOORS and/or Polarion.
• Familiarity with DXL scripting to support customization and automation within requirements management environments.
• Exposure to scripting and integration technologies used in requirements and engineering toolchains, such as REST APIs, XML/ReqIF exchange formats, Python, or database queries.
• Experience in aerospace or defence systems engineering, with exposure to naval platforms considered an asset.
• Understanding of integrated logistics support, life‑cycle material management, and engineering support for complex defence systems.
• Ability to work effectively with government and defence stakeholders, including departments such as national defence organizations.
• Post‑secondary education in systems engineering or a closely related engineering discipline is strongly preferred.

Work Environment

You will work within a defence and security environment supporting large, long‑term naval programs and complex fleet support activities. The role is based in Canada, with an expectation of working 2–3 days per week on site in a modern facility in Kanata, collaborating closely with engineering, logistics, and integrated project teams. The work involves extensive use of requirements management tools, configuration management systems, and related engineering software, as well as participation in structured reviews and stakeholder meetings. You will operate in a professional setting that values rigorous systems engineering practices, audit‑ready documentation, and cross‑functional collaboration, offering exposure to cutting‑edge solutions used to support and enhance naval platforms.

• This posting is for an existing vacancy.

Job Type & Location

This is a Contract position based out of Ottawa, ON.

Pay And Benefits

The pay range for this position is $45.00 - $56.00/hr.

Individual compensation offered for this position within this range will depend on many factors, including qualifications, skills, relevant experience, job knowledge, geographic location, internal equity, and other pertinent job‑related factors.

Workplace Type

This is a hybrid position in Ottawa,ON.

À propos d'Actalent

Actalent est un leader mondial dans les services d’ingénierie et de sciences ainsi que dans les solutions de talents. Nous aidons des entreprises visionnaires à faire progresser leurs initiatives d’ingénierie et de science grâce à l’accès à des experts spécialisés qui favorisent l’échelle, l’innovation et la rapidité de mise sur le marché. Avec un réseau de près de 20 000 consultants et 5 000 clients à travers les États-Unis, le Canada, l’Asie et l’Europe, Actalent dessert de nombreuses entreprises du Fortune 500. Nous sommes fiers d’être l’une des 500 meilleures firmes de conception de l’Engineering News-Record (ENR) pour nos services de conception en ingénierie et un lauréat du prix ClearlyRated Best of Staffing® tant pour le service client que pour les talents.

Actalent est un employeur souscrivant au principe de l’égalité des chances et accepte toutes les candidatures sans tenir compte de la race, du sexe, de l’âge, de la couleur, de la religion, des origines nationales, du statut d’ancien combattant, d’un handicap, de l’orientation sexuelle, de l’identité sexuelle, des renseignements génétiques ou de toute autre caractéristique protégée par la loi.

Si vous souhaitez faire une demande d’accommodement raisonnable, tel que la modification ou l’ajustement du processus de demande d’emploi ou d’entrevue à cause d’un handicap, veuillez envoyer un courriel à [e-mail] pour connaître d’autres options d’accommodement.

Ordonnance sur l’égalité des chances de San Francisco: Conformément à l’Ordonnance sur l’égalité des chances de San Francisco, pour tous les postes situés dans la ville et le comté de San Francisco, nous examinerons les candidatures des personnes qualifiées ayant un casier judiciaire ou des antécédents criminels.

Utilisation de l’intelligence artificielle (IA): Nous pouvons utiliser l’intelligence artificielle (IA) pour soutenir certaines étapes de notre processus d’embauche, notamment la recherche, la présélection et l’évaluation des candidatures. L’IA aide à analyser les candidatures et les qualifications, mais les décisions finales sont prises par notre équipe de recrutement. En soumettant votre candidature, vous reconnaissez et acceptez que celle‑ci puisse être examinée à l’aide d’outils d’IA.

About Actalent

Actalent is a global leader in engineering and sciences services and talent solutions. We help visionary companies advance their engineering and science initiatives through access to specialized experts who drive scale, innovation and speed to market. With a network of almost 20,000 consultants and 5,000 clients across the U.S., Canada, Asia and Europe, Actalent serves many of the Fortune 500. We are proud to be an Engineering News-Record (ENR) Top 500 Design Firm for our engineering design services and a ClearlyRated Best of Staffing® winner for both client and talent service.

The company is an equal opportunity employer and will consider all applications without regard to race, sex, age, color, religion, national origin, veteran status, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity, genetic information or any characteristic protected by law.

If you would like to request a reasonable accommodation, such as the modification or adjustment of the job application process or interviewing process due to a disability, please email [e-mail] for other accommodation options.

San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance

Pursuant to the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, for all positions located in the city and county of San Francisco, we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.

Use of Artificial Intelligence (AI)

We may use Artificial Intelligence (AI) to support parts of our hiring process, including sourcing, screening, and evaluating candidates. AI helps assess applications and qualifications, but final decisions are made by our hiring team. By applying, you acknowledge and agree that your application may be reviewed using AI tools.