Program Chief Engineer

Anduril Anduril · Defense · Irvine, CA · AFS : Air Defense Engineering : Chief Engineering

This role is for a Program Chief Engineer at Anduril Industries, a defense technology company. The focus is on leading autonomous systems for air defense, integrating AI, computer vision, and sensor fusion. The role involves stakeholder engagement, technical ownership, tactical execution, strategic planning, and cross-team collaboration to deliver AI-powered products to military clients.

What you'd actually do

  1. Build and maintain relationships with internal stakeholders, external clients, and industry partners to gather insights, align objectives, and secure buy-in for strategic initiatives. Act as the primary technical liaison for the client, advocate for their needs within the engineering organization and ensure their feedback directly influences the engineering roadmap. Communicate the outputs of these efforts including upcoming software releases, new capabilities, and performance improvement over time.
  2. Drive technical outcomes through meticulous understanding of system performance, drive product development through operational learnings and data, own the technical narrative from product deliver through continuous improvements. Credibly represent our system in front of technical and nontechnical clients
  3. Bring clarity to the path between engineering development and operational delivery. Whether through sprint planning and execution or on-the-ground support of test events, attack blockers and guide the team through fast-paced execution to deliver the optimal technical outcome for the client.
  4. Translate strategic business goals and program requirements into actionable project plans, setting clear milestones, and driving initiatives from conception through to successful completion, ensuring they deliver intended outcomes and add value to the business. Oversee the allocation of personnel, budget, and other resources to ensure successful execution of these initiatives. When possible, lead with data.
  5. Execute on broad and/or ambiguous requirements from external clients. Seize the opportunity to shape requirements in favor of the optimal product for the client and the company. Demonstrate high ownership on all pieces of work. Become a trusted partner to Anduril’s engineers.

Skills

Required

  • 5+ years experience as a Lead Engineer, Technical Program Manager, Technical Product Manager, or Engineer in an autonomous systems, robotics
  • Technical leadership
  • Client relationship management
  • Stakeholder engagement
  • Product development
  • Technical program management
  • Strategic planning
  • Cross-functional team collaboration
  • Communication skills

Nice to have

  • Experience in defense technology
  • Experience with military clients
  • Experience with AI-powered operating systems
  • Experience with Lattice OS

What the JD emphasized

  • autonomous systems
  • AI
  • computer vision
  • sensor fusion
  • autonomy

Other signals

  • AI-powered operating system
  • autonomous robots
  • autonomy, AI, computer vision, sensor fusion
  • software-enabled Air Defense family of systems
  • autonomous family of networked sensors and effectors