Senior Flight Research Software Project Engineer

Joby Aviation•Santa Cruz, CA

About The Position

Joby Flight Research designs, develops, and flight-tests novel aircraft using a software-first autonomy approach. We build and deploy autonomy, perception, planning, and radar systems across conventional, electric, and hydrogen-electric aircraft in both CTOL and VTOL configurations. Joby Aviation's Flight Research team is looking for a Senior Software Project Engineer to help drive technical execution across our software and autonomy development portfolio. You will work across multiple concurrent workstreams, including flight controls, mission management, embedded systems, simulation, ground control station software, and test infrastructure to help the team prioritize the highest-value work and deliver software tied to flight test campaigns and program milestones. We are a small, close-knit and agile team building software that flies on novel fly-by-wire aircraft. The role requires someone who can operate effectively in an environment where priorities shift based on evolving program needs. You will partner closely with engineering, flight test and program leads to translate high-level objectives into technically grounded execution plans, maintain clarity around dependencies and risks, and keep the team focused on what matters most.

Requirements

Bachelor's degree in Engineering, Computer Science, or related technical field.
8+ years of experience in software engineering, project engineering, technical leadership, or technical execution for software-intensive systems.
Hands-on software development experience or demonstrated ability to operate deeply in software architecture, implementation workflows, and technical risk.
Demonstrated ability to understand complex software systems, ask high-quality technical questions, and reason about architecture, interfaces, integration, and release risk.
Experience helping organize or drive execution in a hardware-integrated or embedded systems environment where software delivery is coupled to physical test milestones.
Strong organizational skills with experience maintaining integrated plans across multiple concurrent technical workstreams.
Excellent communication skills, including the ability to communicate technical plans, risks, trade-offs, and priorities clearly to both engineering and program stakeholders.
Experience with iterative development practices in a context where requirements and program needs evolve quickly.
Comfort with ambiguity and the ability to maintain forward progress when the plan is changing.
Proficiency with project management and collaboration tools such as ClickUp, Jira, Smartsheet, or similar.
This position must meet US export control compliance requirements, therefore a candidate must qualify as a “US Person” as defined by 22 C.F.R. § 120.15. “US Person” includes US Citizens, lawful permanent residents, refugees, or asylees.

Nice To Haves

Aerospace, defense, or robotics industry experience.
Experience supporting flight test programs or hardware development programs with tightly coupled software deliverables.
Prior experience as a software engineer, technical lead, systems engineer, project engineer, or integration engineer on a software-intensive system.
Familiarity with software configuration management and release processes for safety-critical or embedded systems.
Understanding of GNC, flight software, embedded systems, build systems, simulation, and modern software development processes.
Familiarity with systems engineering processes, including requirements management, V&V planning, traceability, and interface definition.
Experience managing cross-site technical execution or coordinating between engineering and flight test at different locations

Responsibilities

Own the integrated software execution plan across programs, maintaining a clear view of workstreams, dependencies, milestones, technical risks, and critical path.
Work with software engineering leads to decompose high-level program objectives into actionable engineering work with clear priorities, owners, and acceptance criteria.
Coordinate planning and prioritization across GNC, flight software, embedded systems, simulation, GCS, and test infrastructure teams.
Use technical judgment to identify unrealistic plans, missing dependencies, ambiguous requirements, and integration risks before they become blockers.
Recommend lightweight process for project management and engineering execution, adapted to the team's needs to increase development velocity without adding unnecessary overhead.
Track and communicate schedule risks, blockers, and technical trade-offs to engineering leadership and program management.
Surface problems early and drive resolution.
Manage cross-team dependencies, particularly at the boundary between software development, hardware, systems engineering, and flight test.
Coordinate the software design-implementation-release lifecycle in collaboration with software engineering leads, including design reviews, implementation sequencing, integration readiness, and release planning.
Support flight test campaign planning by ensuring software deliverables are technically scoped, scheduled, tested, and tracked against test objectives.
Help maintain team-level organization around priorities, commitments, decision records, and follow-through so that the engineering team can execute with clarity.