{"id":2798779,"url":"https://alion.io/job/shield-ai-manager-environmental-control-systems-thermal-engineering-r6306","title":"Manager, Environmental Control Systems & Thermal Engineering (R6306)","company":{"id":50,"name":"Shield AI","domain":"shield.ai","url":"https://alion.io/company/shield-ai","size_band":"1001-5000","is_staffing_agency":false,"employer_type":"direct","is_intermediary":false,"listed_via":null,"ats_vendor":"Lever","truth_index":{"grade":"B","score":73,"open_postings":82,"ghost_share":0,"stale_share":0.866,"repost_share":0,"time_to_fill_p50_days":65,"computed_at":"2026-10-27T05:46:45Z"}},"role":"Robotics","role_family":"Robotics","seniority":"senior","employment_type":"full_time","work_mode":"on_site","remote_scope":null,"remote_scope_basis":null,"remote_working_hours":null,"hiring_geo_confidence":"structured","locations":["Seattle, United States"],"countries":["US"],"hiring_countries":[],"hiring_countries_total":0,"salary":{"min":200000,"max":300000,"currency":"USD","period":"year","gross":null,"usd_annual":300000},"salary_estimate":null,"experience_years_min":8,"visa_sponsorship":false,"relocation_package":false,"has_equity":false,"technologies":[{"name":"Amazon ECS","optional":false},{"name":"DO-160","optional":true},{"name":"MIL-STD-810","optional":true},{"name":"STAR-CCM+","optional":true},{"name":"Thermal Desktop","optional":true}],"status":"live","first_seen_at":"2026-10-18T00:30:23Z","employer_posted_date":"2026-10-18","last_verified_at":"2026-10-27T20:39:10Z","board_verified":true,"closed_at":null,"days_open":9,"trust":{"level":"ok","repost_count":null,"flags":[],"days_open":9},"description":"Job Description:\nAs Manager, Environmental Control Systems & Thermal, you will directly lead and develop a team of individual contributors responsible for environmental control systems, aircraft thermal management, and associated fluid and heat-transfer hardware on the X-BAT program, while supporting the advancement of these capabilities across Group 5 programs. You will be accountable for team execution and people development while maintaining enough technical depth to guide architecture, requirements, design, integration, test, supplier execution, and flight readiness. This position requires a balance of direct people leadership, technical judgment, and hands-on engagement when needed in a fast-moving aircraft development environment. The ideal candidate is an experienced engineering manager who can set clear priorities, grow strong engineers, create a high technical bar, and help the team deliver meaningful capability to operators quickly.\nWhat you'll do:\nPeople Leadership and Development: Manage, mentor, and develop individual contributors; set goals, give feedback, support growth, and build a high-trust, high-standard team.\nTeam Planning and Execution: Set priorities, ownership, staffing, and execution cadence for X-BAT and Group 5 work; remove blockers and manage dependencies.\nTechnical Direction and Review: Guide ECS and thermal architecture, trades, and design reviews across thermal environments, cooling, airflow, ducting, heat exchangers, fluid circuits, and related hardware.\nRequirements, Risk, and Maturity: Set expectations for requirements, reviews, verification, risk management, configuration control, and design release through flight-ready hardware.\nVehicle Integration and Interfaces: Resolve interfaces with structures, propulsion, avionics, EWIS, payloads, manufacturing, systems engineering, and test teams.\nTest and Flight Readiness: Lead component, qualification, ground, and flight test planning; ensure data, anomaly resolution, and corrective actions support hardware delivery.\nHardware and Suppliers: Set expectations for components, specifications, SOWs, supplier reviews, prototype builds, and acceptance activities.\nHands-On Technical Leadership: Engage in first-principles analysis and root-cause investigations, coach engineers, and unblock complex technical problems.\nCommunication and Accountability: Represent the team in program and engineering reviews; communicate decisions, risks, progress, resources, and dependencies.\nRequired qualifications:\nClearance required: US Citizens Only & Must have an Active Secret or higher clearance.\nExperience: 8+ years in aerospace environmental control systems, thermal engineering, fluid systems, or comparable aircraft mechanical systems development.\nPeople Leadership: Experience directly managing and developing individual contributors, including setting expectations, giving feedback, and supporting career growth.\nEducation: B.S. or M.S. in Mechanical Engineering, Aerospace Engineering, or a related technical discipline.\nCore Fundamentals: Deep understanding of thermodynamics, heat transfer, fluid dynamics, and aircraft thermal management.\nSystem Development Leadership: Ability to guide architecture, requirements, analysis, design, integration, and verification through hardware delivery.\nTechnical Judgment and Communication: Sound engineering judgment, early risk identification, and clear communication across technical and program teams.\nTeam Culture: Record of working hard, building trust, maintaining high standards, and treating others with kindness.\nPreferred qualifications:\nExperience managing engineers on UAV, autonomous aircraft, fighter, tactical aircraft, or other high-performance aerospace programs.\nExperience with Group 5 aircraft, aircraft-level thermal management, ECS, or integrated fluid and thermal systems.\nHands-on experience with thermal and fluid testing, instrumentation, data acquisition, model correlation, or flight-test troubleshooting.\nExperience with first-principles analysis, fluid-thermal network modeling, CFD, or thermal-analysis tools such as FloEFD, STAR-CCM+, Thermal Desktop, Amesim, or Flowmaster.\nFamiliarity with aerospace environmental, qualification, and airworthiness practices, including MIL-STD-810, MIL-HDBK-516, RTCA DO-160, and SAE AIR or ARP standards.\nExperience with aerospace suppliers, COTS or custom components, technical specifications, SOWs, and prototype or vehicle-level test setups.\nExperience hiring, onboarding, and scaling a small engineering team in a rapid R&D or production environment.\nAdvanced degree in Mechanical Engineering, Aerospace Engineering, or a related 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