Manager, Electronics Engineering

Peraton•Palestine, TX

2d•$112,000 - $179,000

About The Position

Peraton provides management and technical support for NASA’s scientific balloon program which supports enabling science missions for NASA and universities across the United States and foreign scientific communities. Scientific balloon missions provide researchers inexpensive, relatively quick, long duration access to near space altitudes and environments. Balloon missions cost orders of magnitude less than satellite missions and provide platforms for heavy experiments (some greater than 5000 lbs)... to operate for weeks and even months. Balloon missions have provided significant science theories and discoveries about cosmic rays, gamma ray and x-ray astronomy, optical and UV astronomy, atmospheric sciences, and cosmic microwave background studies. Our staff are located at the Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility (CSBF) in Palestine, TX where we design, analyze, build and assembly the support hardware and balloon gondola payloads for the missions. We launch the balloons from locations within the United States (Texas, New Mexico, and Hawaii) and around the world including Antarctica, Sweden, New Zealand and Australia. Our engineers and technician staff support the launches and balloon and payload recoveries in the US and many worldwide locations. Peraton’s NASA Balloon Operations Contract (NBOC) program is seeking an Engineering Manager to join our team in Palestine, Texas. We are seeking a candidate to manage the manufacture, test, integration, and operation of electronics and electro-mechanical systems. for NASA Balloon missions from inception through flight. We are looking for an Engineering Manager that can manage the day-to-day tactical duties, provide status reports, and manage the Balloon Electronics Shop. Responsible for the overall schedule, direction, coordination, implementation, execution, control and completion of NASA balloon electronics and electro-mechanical systems ensuring consistency with company and NASA Balloon Program Office technical strategy, commitments and goals. Manage field operations which could require travel for periods up to eight weeks or more several times a year both in the United States and overseas.

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering with 10 years of experience, or in lieu of degree a minimum of 15 years’ experience including supervisory experience
Experience in strategic planning
Must be able to travel up to 60% of the year
Must be able to pass the physical (medical) requirements to travel to Antarctica
Must be able to obtain travel visa
Must be a US citizen

Nice To Haves

NASA Balloon experience
Critical thinking and problem-solving skills
Strong planning and organizing skills

Responsibilities

Manage and direct engineering activities with area supervisors, subordinates and any teammate subcontractors to research and design new products, modify existing designs, improve production techniques, and develop test procedures.
Ensure the ISO documentation, stockroom configuration, drawings, records, and quality are uniform across the program.
Confer with management, production, and business staff to determine engineering feasibility, cost effectiveness, and customer demand for new or enhanced existing products; forecast operating costs.
Direct personnel group activities such as recruitment, hiring, training, performance evaluations, and salary adjustments.
Monitor fabrication efforts; direct field testing of products and systems performed by field staff.
Provide expertise in hardware and/or software, systems analysis, design, development, integration, test, and validation operations, or serve as expert authority in engineering disciplines.
Support failure analysis board reviews and material review board.
Support complex / technologically challenging tasks including: leadership for generating plans, providing guidance during task implementation, conducting technology assessments, making recommendations for technology insertions, making trade study assessments and recommendations, supporting all mission life cycle reviews, and reviewing deliverables.
Provide technical consultation advice regarding design issues, development and test approaches, and test result assessments; provide lead technical role to other departments and groups.
Lead teams established by the program manager to conduct investigations of programmatic or task level problems and make recommendations for recovery plans; provide recommendations regarding Safety and Reliability and Quality Assurance implementation considerations.
As assigned, manage Risk Management, Systems Engineering, and Lessons Learned Processes.
Interact with external contacts and customers.
Present reports defining project progress, problems and solutions.
Provide direction to perform prototype assembly, environmental testing and qualification tasks.
Experience with ground support equipment maintenance. Manage completion project documentation such as procedures, change requests, schematics, and wiring diagrams.
Experience with diagnostic test equipment to troubleshoot, repair, and operate electronic systems with analog, digital and video electronics, able to train team members.