Subject Matter Expert (SME) - System Requirements Management

ALTEN Technology USA•Auburn Hills, MI

19h

About The Position

ALTEN Technology USA is an engineering company that partners with clients to bring innovative ideas to life across various industries, including aerospace, medical devices, and automotive. As part of the global ALTEN Group, we offer end-to-end product development services. Joining ALTEN Technology USA means collaborating on challenging engineering projects with opportunities for mentorship, career growth, and comprehensive benefits in a supportive culture. The Subject Matter Expert (SME) – System Requirements Management will provide technical leadership for system requirements activities related to vehicle feature development. This role operates upstream of product design and verification, assessing the impact of new features, modifications, and carry-over content on existing vehicle system requirements. The SME acts as the primary authority for requirements management, ensuring technical changes are properly evaluated, documented, justified, and released before design and validation commence. This position serves as a crucial link between Vehicle Feature Owners, Systems Engineering, Architecture, Design Engineering, and Test & Validation teams. Success requires strong systems engineering knowledge, technical judgment, assertiveness, stakeholder management skills, and the ability to advocate for requirement decisions that may affect program timelines, costs, and downstream engineering efforts. Additionally, the SME will function as a Cluster Lead, offering operational leadership and mentorship to a team of Requirements Engineers.

Requirements

Bachelor's degree in Engineering or related technical discipline.
Significant experience in Systems Engineering, Requirements Engineering, Product Development, or Vehicle Systems Development.
Experience serving as System Engineer, System Architect, Design Lead, Lead Systems Engineer, or Requirements Lead.
Strong understanding of system requirements development.
Strong understanding of requirement decomposition and allocation.
Strong understanding of requirement change management.
Strong understanding of systems engineering principles.
Strong understanding of system architecture fundamentals.
Strong understanding of cross-functional system integration.
Strong understanding of technical impact assessment.
Strong understanding of engineering change management.
Strong understanding of risk assessment methodologies.
Experience with requirements management tools such as IBM DOORS / DOORS Next, Polarion, Jama, Codebeamer, or equivalent platforms.

Nice To Haves

Automotive product development experience.
Vehicle E/E architecture knowledge.
INCOSE certification (ASEP, CSEP, or ESEP).
Experience with MBSE methodologies.
Prior customer-facing technical leadership experience.
First-level people leadership or team lead experience.

Responsibilities

Evaluate technical impacts associated with new vehicle features, feature enhancements, feature modifications, and carry-over content between vehicle programs.
Determine whether changes necessitate the creation, modification, or release of system requirements.
Provide technical direction to Requirements Engineers on required updates and rework activities.
Ensure requirements are complete, consistent, traceable, verifiable, and aligned with intended feature functionality.
Drive requirement reviews and release decisions, serving as the technical authority for system requirement content and quality.
Operate upstream of design engineering and validation organizations.
Translate customer, business, regulatory, and feature needs into robust system-level requirements.
Analyze feature interactions and cross-functional dependencies.
Identify technical gaps, assumptions, conflicts, and risks during early development phases.
Support the development of system architecture concepts to ensure requirement quality.
Collaborate with Vehicle Feature Owners and Architecture teams to assess technical impacts of proposed changes.
Represent the Requirements Management organization in client and customer-facing discussions.
Defend requirement decisions and recommendations when challenged by development teams.
Facilitate technical alignment among Vehicle Feature Owners, Systems Engineering, Architecture teams, Design Engineering teams, Test & Validation organizations, and Program leadership.
Present and synthesize complex technical information to diverse audiences, from technical specialists to executive stakeholders.
Drive decisions through influence and technical credibility.
Promote INCOSE-aligned systems engineering practices.
Improve requirements management methodologies, standards, and governance processes.
Contribute to organizational capability growth in Requirements Engineering, Systems Engineering, Change Management, and Technical Risk Assessment.
Lead and mentor a team of Requirements Engineers.
Provide technical coaching to the team.
Establish workload priorities and engineering objectives for the team.
Promote a collaborative, high-performance team culture.
Perform workload planning and task scheduling for the team.
Monitor team deliverables and project milestones.
Support resource planning and prioritization activities.
Escalate team-related issues and risks appropriately.
Conduct technical and program risk assessments.
Identify requirement-related risks early.
Develop mitigation strategies for identified risks.
Support issue resolution and cross-functional decision-making.