Project Manager Defense Systems

Air Methods•Englewood, CO

1d•$113,400 - $144,375•Onsite

About The Position

The Project Manager is responsible for leading assigned projects from contract award or project authorization through delivery, acceptance, and closeout. This role provides disciplined project leadership across scope, schedule, cost, risk, quality, resources, stakeholder communication, change control, and business performance. The Project Manager coordinates cross-functional execution among Engineering, Certification, Manufacturing, Supply Chain, Quality, Operations, Finance, Customer Experience, Customer Support, and other business functions to ensure projects are planned, baselined, executed, monitored, controlled, and closed in alignment with contractual requirements, internal business objectives, customer commitments, and applicable regulatory or quality system requirements. The Project Manager serves as the primary project execution leader and is accountable for maintaining project visibility, driving timely decisions, identifying and mitigating risks, managing project performance to approved baselines, and escalating constraints that may affect cost, quality, schedule, scope, compliance, customer satisfaction, or business performance.

Requirements

Demonstrated ability to lead complex, cross-functional aerospace or defense programs from contract award through delivery and closeout, with full accountability for scope, schedule, cost, risk, and performance outcomes.
Proven capability to operate as the primary execution authority within a matrixed organization, driving alignment across engineering, certification, manufacturing, supply chain, quality, operations, and customer stakeholders.
Strong working knowledge of project management disciplines, including integrated master scheduling (IMS), work breakdown structures (WBS), baseline management, earned value or cost/ schedule performance tracking, and structured risk and issue management.
Ability to translate contractual and technical requirements into executable project plans and maintain disciplined change control throughout the program lifecycle.
Demonstrated experience operating within regulated aerospace environments, with practical understanding of certification, quality systems, configuration control, and traceability expectations.
Ability to manage projects in compliance with internal procedures and external regulatory frameworks, ensuring audit-defensible execution and documentation.
Proven leadership capability in driving decisions, resolving cross-functional conflicts, and holding stakeholders accountable to commitments without direct authority.
Ability to escalate constraints appropriately and lead recovery planning to protect delivery, cost, and quality objectives.
Bachelor’s degree (BS/BA) in Engineering, Aviation, Business, Program Management, or a related technical discipline from an accredited institution seven or more years’ related aviation or aerospace industry experience and/or training; or equivalent combination of education and experience.
Minimum of seven (7) years of progressive experience in project or program management within the aerospace, aviation, defense, or closely related regulated industry, including direct responsibility for managing scope, schedule, cost, and risk on complex projects.
Demonstrated experience leading cross-functional teams in a matrixed environment, including coordination of engineering, certification, manufacturing, and operational stakeholders through defined project lifecycle phases from planning through delivery and closeout.
Hands-on experience developing and managing integrated project schedules, resource plans, and project baselines, including demonstrated success in meeting contractual or customer delivery commitments.
Proficient in Microsoft Office Suite, including advanced use of Excel (data analysis, tracking, reporting), PowerPoint (executive reporting), and Word (formal documentation).
Demonstrated proficiency with project scheduling and management tools such as Microsoft Project or e

Nice To Haves

Practical experience with aircraft modifications, MRO, STC development/ V&V qualification, product manufacturing, or similar aerospace programs strongly preferred.
Experience operating in defense or government contracting environments, including familiarity with contractual requirements, customer reporting expectations, and compliance constraints, preferred.
Equivalent combination of education, training, and experience may be considered where directly applicable to the role.

Responsibilities

Develop, maintain, and manage project execution plans for assigned projects, including scope definition, work breakdown structure, schedule baseline, cost baseline, resource planning, communication cadence, risk management approach, quality expectations, change-control process, and closeout requirements.
Lead cross-functional project execution through Engineering, Certification, Manufacturing, Supply Chain, Quality, Operations, Finance, Customer Experience, Customer Support, and other stakeholders to ensure project work is properly planned, sequenced, resourced, monitored, and completed.
Manage integrated project schedules, including milestone planning, dependency management, critical path awareness, schedule status, recovery planning, and timely escalation of constraints affecting project delivery.
Monitor project cost, revenue, margin, earned value, budget performance, estimates at completion, and financial risk in coordination with Finance, Operations, and functional leaders. Identify unfavorable trends and lead corrective-action planning to protect project and business performance.
Maintain project risk, issue, action, and decision logs. Assign owners and due dates, track mitigation and recovery actions, ensure timely closure, and escalate unresolved risks or decisions through appropriate governance channels.
Manage project scope and change-control discipline. Identify out-of-scope requests, coordinate impact assessments, support internal and customer change decisions, and ensure approved changes are reflected in project scope, schedule, cost, delivery commitments, and stakeholder communications.
Provide clear, timely, and accurate project status reporting to internal and external stakeholders, including performance to plan, schedule health, cost performance, risks, issues, actions, decisions needed, recovery plans, and customer impacts.
Coordinate delivery readiness, customer acceptance, contractual or project closeout, lessons learned, transition to post-delivery support, and customer satisfaction feedback.
Support continuous improvement of project management processes, tools, reporting methods, governance routines, and project execution standards.
Other Duties as assigned