Robotics Software Lead: Field Robotics & Systems Architect

HITT Contracting Inc; Washington (District of Columbia); On-site; USD 120,000 - 175,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Bonuses

Health insurance

401(k)

Job summary

HITT Contracting is seeking a Robotics Software Lead to set the technical direction for the robotics software stack and lead a team through design, development, testing, and deployment on active construction sites. You will own architecture decisions, drive automation, and coordinate with hardware, IT, and project teams.

The role requires a strong product mindset, hands-on engineering leadership, and experience delivering complex field robotics in real-world environments.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in robotics, computer science, software engineering, electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, or related field, advanced degree preferred.
• 5+ years of robotics software development, including demonstrated experience leading software engineering teams that developed and deployed complex field robotics applications in real-world environments.
• Experience applying product management practices to define requirements, prioritize roadmaps and backlogs, plan releases, and incorporate end-user feedback.
• Proficiency in C++, Python, and Linux-based robotics development and system-level troubleshooting.

Responsibilities

• Own the architecture and technical direction of the robotics software stack, including system interfaces, design standards, and technical review practices.
• Own the software infrastructure that supports development, simulation, automated testing, CI/CD, deployment, observability, data collection, and fleet support.
• Guide technical decisions across autonomy, perception, manipulation, operator interfaces, embedded compute, networking, simulation, and cloud-connected services.
• Lead efforts to integrate and extend third-party technologies via APIs, SDKs, middleware, and other software interfaces.
• Ensure software designs account for safety, cybersecurity, maintainability, degraded operating modes, and environmental constraints of active construction sites.
• Establish standards for AI-assisted and agentic software development, including human review, automated testing, evaluation, and guardrails.
• Remain a hands-on technical contributor including architecture reviews, code reviews, prototyping, system integration, and diagnosis of difficult cross-stack issues.
• Travel to active construction sites and participate directly in testing, deployment, and operational support.
• Team Leadership and Delivery Lead, manage and mentor a team of software engineers, setting clear expectations and supporting their development.
• Coordinate day-to-day R&D work by translating priorities into actionable plans, assigning ownership, tracking dependencies, and resolving blockers.
• Establish engineering plans, milestones, release criteria, and quality expectations for multiple concurrent robotics initiatives.
• Use product management practices to translate user needs, field observations, and business priorities into requirements, backlogs, experiments, and release plans.
• Promote disciplined software engineering practices, including documentation, version control, automated testing, CI/CD, configuration management, and reproducible environments.
• Support team growth through staffing, onboarding, feedback, and knowledge sharing.
• Partnerships and Cross-Functional Coordination Lead the technical delivery of co-development initiatives with technology partners and vendors.
• Evaluate third-party technologies and recommend build/buy/adapt/partner decisions based on fit, lifecycle cost, schedule, risk, and supportability.
• Coordinate software priorities with hardware engineering, field testing, project teams, operations, IT, cybersecurity, and other departments.
• Research and Development Roadmap Support the development of the R&D roadmap by identifying software capabilities, dependencies, risks, and validation plans.
• Plan and oversee structured testing in the lab and on active construction projects; use results to prioritize engineering work and guide decisions.

Skills

C++

Python

Linux

CI/CD

Robotics software

Leadership

APIs/SDKs

AI-assisted development

Communication

Education

Bachelor’s degree in robotics/CS/engineering

Advanced degree preferred

Tools

Git

Docker

ROS 2

Gazebo

NVIDIA Isaac Sim

Azure DevOps

React

GStreamer

Job description

HITT Contracting is seeking a Robotics Software Lead to set the technical direction for the robotics software stack and lead a team through design, development, testing, and deployment on active construction sites. You will own architecture decisions, drive automation, and coordinate with hardware, IT, and project teams.

The role requires a strong product mindset, hands-on engineering leadership, and experience delivering complex field robotics in real-world environments.