Director of Mission Engineering

Job Responsibilities

• Lead the mission engineering function at Turion Space, building a high-performing team and establishing the processes and tools needed to deliver rigorous mission analysis.
• Support engagements with customers and stakeholders to understand, analyze, and translate mission needs into actionable engineering requirements.
• Lead modeling and simulation efforts to characterize and understand the mission space.
• Lead efforts to define Turion's commercial space offerings.
• Implement mission-specific Design Reference Missions (DRMs) within simulation environments to frame and evaluate system performance.
• Support material and non-material solution architecting in response to mission needs and capability gaps.
• Lead system trade studies to inform architecture, design, and investment decisions.
• Demonstrate and quantify Turion's system performance in the context of the DRMs.
• Partner closely with engineering functional teams to align technical solutions with mission objectives.
• Collaborate with business development to translate customer mission needs into compelling, technically grounded solutions.
• Build, mentor, and lead the mission engineering function and its team.
• Communicate mission engineering findings and recommendations to engineering leadership, executives, and customers.

Basic Qualifications

• M.S. in Aerospace Engineering, Astronautical Engineering, Systems Engineering, or a related technical field.
• 10+ years of professional experience in mission engineering, systems engineering, or modeling and simulation, including experience in a technical leadership role.
• Demonstrated experience developing and implementing Design Reference Missions (DRMs) and mission-level modeling and simulation.
• Experience leading system trade studies and supporting solution architecting (material and non-material).
• Strong understanding of space mission design, concepts of operations (CONOPS), and end-to-end system performance analysis.
• Demonstrated ability to work across engineering disciplines and with non-engineering stakeholders to drive toward mission objectives.
• Must be a U.S. Citizen (dual citizenship not accepted).
• Must be able to obtain and maintain a Top Secret security clearance.

Preferred Qualifications

• M.S. or Ph.D. in an aerospace, astronautical, systems engineering, or related technical discipline.
• Experience supporting business development, capture, or proposal efforts in the aerospace or defense industry.
• Familiarity with defense capability development processes and non-material solution analysis (e.g., DOTMLPF, JCIDS, capability-based assessments).
• Experience with space domain awareness (SDA), space situational awareness (SSA), or related mission areas.
• Experience building and leading high-performing engineering teams.