Chief Engineer

General Atomics Intelligence; Poway (CA); On-site; USD 141,000 - 257,000; Full time

Job summary

GA-Intelligence is seeking a Chief Engineer for a senior technical leadership role in a large-scale operational software environment. The person will initially act as Deputy Chief Engineer and will transition to Chief Engineer, partnering with current leaders to learn the system and drive technical direction.

The role covers real‑time data processing, tracking, fusion, geospatial workflows, and mission-critical reliability, with broad cross-team collaboration and DoD‑level engagements.

Qualifications

• Thirteen+ years of progressively complex engineering experience.
• Significant experience leading software engineering for large, complex distributed systems.
• Senior technical leadership roles such as Chief Engineer, Deputy Chief Engineer, Chief Architect, or Technical Director.

Responsibilities

• Partner with the current Chief Engineer to understand architecture and roadmap.
• Define and maintain the overall technical direction of a complex software ecosystem.
• Provide technical leadership across multiple teams and disciplines.
• Guide major architectural decisions and tradeoffs among performance, resiliency, maintainability, and scalability.
• Take ownership of end‑to‑end system integrity and sound technical decisions.
• Identify technical risks and integration challenges early.
• Ensure strong engineering rigor in design, testing strategy, and execution.
• Collaborate with program management, engineering managers, product leadership, and technical leads.
• Mentor technical leaders and strengthen the engineering bench.
• Represent the program in customer and stakeholder engagements as needed.
• Progressively assume broader technical ownership toward Chief Engineer role.

Education

Bachelor's/Master's/PhD in engineering or related field

Job description

Job Summary

General Atomics Integrated Intelligence Inc. (GA-Intelligence) develops cutting-edge software solutions that transform raw data into actionable intelligence. We specialize in real-time global situational awareness and battle management, processing petabytes of data from hundreds of sources across air, land, and sea. Our systems—including the widely used THRESHER and DRAGONSPELL platforms—support tens of thousands of users at all levels of the DoD and Intelligence Community and enable critical decision‑making for national security missions. We process hundreds of thousands of observations per minute, operating at the scale of global sensor networks and battlefield telemetry. Our backend architecture leverages technologies like Kafka, AWS, NiFi, and GeoMesa—the latter of which we designed and open‑sourced—to deliver high‑throughput, mission‑resilient systems that turn streaming data into real‑time intelligence.

Job Summary

General Atomics Integrated Intelligence Inc. (GA-Intelligence) develops cutting‑edge software solutions that transform raw data into actionable intelligence. We specialize in real‑time global situational awareness and battle management, processing petabytes of data from hundreds of sources across air, land, and sea. Our systems—including the widely used THRESHER and DRAGONSPELL platforms—support tens of thousands of users at all levels of the DoD and Intelligence Community and enable critical decision‑making for national security missions. We process hundreds of thousands of observations per minute, operating at the scale of global sensor networks and battlefield telemetry. Our backend architecture leverages technologies like Kafka, AWS, NiFi, and GeoMesa—the latter of which we designed and open‑sourced to deliver high‑throughput, mission‑resilient systems that turn streaming data into real‑time intelligence.

GA-Intelligence is seeking a Chief Engineer to help lead the technical direction of one of our commercial and international software programs. This individual will initially act as the Deputy Chief Engineer and will work in close partnership with the current Chief Engineer to learn the system, build trust across the organization, and progressively assume broader technical leadership responsibilities. Over time (approximately six months), this person will transition into the Chief Engineer role.

This is a senior technical leadership role for a large-scale operational software environment supporting commercial and international missions. The system is a complex, real‑time platform focused on global situational awareness, tracking, data fusion, geospatial workflows, and operational decision support. It serves a large user base, integrates with numerous internal and external systems, and must operate with high reliability in demanding mission contexts.

The right candidate is a strong systems thinker, an experienced software and architecture leader, and a credible technical authority who will own the system. This person must be proactive, exercise sound engineering judgment, and have the confidence to make bold but disciplined technical decisions. Additionally, they should have experience and skill gaining concurrence for both technical and programmatic solutions with partners and customers. They should be comfortable setting direction, driving clarity, and taking accountability for outcomes without creating unnecessary risk in a mission‑critical environment.

DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES

• Partner with the current Chief Engineer to understand the architecture, technical roadmap, dependencies, operational context, and major risks across the program.
• Help define and maintain the overall technical direction of a complex software ecosystem involving real‑time data ingest, tracking, fusion, geospatial capabilities, analytics, and external integrations.
• Provide technical leadership across multiple teams, subsystems, and engineering disciplines.
• Guide major architectural decisions and evaluate tradeoffs among performance, resiliency, maintainability, scalability, delivery speed, and long‑term system health.
• Take ownership of end‑to‑end system integrity and help ensure the program is making sound technical decisions across teams.
• Proactively identify technical risks, architectural friction points, and integration challenges before they become larger issues.
• Help ensure strong engineering rigor in system design, integration planning, testing strategy, and technical execution.
• Work closely with program management, engineering managers, product leadership, and technical leads to align architecture and delivery.
• Support technical planning, modernization efforts, risk reduction, release readiness, and cross‑team coordination.
• Manage disparate or competing needs among multiple business partners and customers, gaining acceptance for proposed solutions and timelines.
• Mentor technical leaders and help strengthen the engineering bench across the organization.
• Represent the program as a senior technical leader in customer and stakeholder engagements when needed, being comfortable and effective briefing both customers and partners.
• Progressively take on broader technical ownership in preparation for transition into the Chief Engineer role.

We recognize and appreciate the value and contributions of individuals with diverse backgrounds and experiences and welcome all qualified individuals to apply.

Job Qualifications

• Typically requires a Bachelors, Masters or PhD in engineering or a related technical field as well as thirteen or more years of progressively complex engineering experience. May substitute equivalent experience in lieu of education.
• Significant experience leading software engineering for large, complex, distributed systems.
• Experience serving in a senior technical leadership role such as Chief Engineer, Deputy Chief Engineer, Chief Architect, Principal Engineer, Technical Director, or similar.
• Strong systems engineering mindset and ability to understand complex end‑to‑end system behavior across many interacting components.
• Experience with mission‑critical operational systems where reliability, performance, and up‑time matter.
• Demonstrated ability to lead across organizational boundaries and influence multiple teams.
• Proactive leadership style with a strong sense of ownership and accountability.
• Sound engineering judgment and the confidence to make bold but disciplined decisions.
• Experience and skill in navigating disparate goals across multiple teams, partners, and customers.
• Strong communication skills, including the ability to explain complex technical issues to senior leaders, customers, and mixed technical/non‑technical audiences.
• The ability obtain and maintain a DoD clearance.

PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS

• Experience with real‑time data processing, tracking, sensor integration, data fusion, geospatial systems, or operational command‑and‑control style environments.
• Experience with cloud and distributed data systems, event‑driven architectures, and large‑scale integration environments.
• Experience working in, and debugging to solution for one‑off, unusual customer architectures.
• Experience mentoring senior engineers and building technical leadership bench strength.

What Success Looks Like

In the first phase, the Chief Engineer will build a deep understanding of the mission, architecture, technical risks, and organizational landscape, while becoming a trusted partner to the current Chief Engineer and engineering leadership team. Over time, this individual will assume greater ownership of technical direction, improve architectural clarity and cross‑team alignment, proactively address risk, and be prepared to transition into the Chief Engineer role.

Why Join GA-Intelligence

GA-Intelligence builds mission‑critical software systems that support some of the most important national security missions in the country. Our teams work on technically hard problems with real operational impact, including global situational awareness, tracking, fusion, and decision support at scale.

This role offers the opportunity to help shape the future of a major operational system, partner with highly capable leaders and engineers, and grow into the senior technical leadership role for a large, complex, mission‑driven program.

Job Type: Full‑Time Salary

Salary range: 140,900 - 257,233