{"id":138710,"url":"https://alion.io/job/true-anomaly-engineering-manager-autonomy","title":"Engineering Manager, Autonomy","company":{"id":3381,"name":"True Anomaly","domain":"trueanomaly.space","url":"https://alion.io/company/true-anomaly","size_band":"1001-5000","is_staffing_agency":false,"employer_type":"direct","is_intermediary":false,"listed_via":null,"ats_vendor":"Greenhouse","truth_index":{"grade":"A","score":92,"open_postings":168,"ghost_share":0.054,"stale_share":0,"repost_share":0.006,"time_to_fill_p50_days":101,"computed_at":"2026-10-17T05:46:00Z"}},"role":"Leadership","role_family":"Leadership","seniority":"lead","employment_type":"contractor","work_mode":"on_site","remote_scope":null,"remote_scope_basis":null,"remote_working_hours":null,"hiring_geo_confidence":"structured","locations":["Denver, United States","Long Beach, United States"],"countries":["US"],"hiring_countries":[],"hiring_countries_total":0,"salary":{"min":205000,"max":315000,"currency":"USD","period":"year","gross":null,"usd_annual":315000},"salary_estimate":null,"experience_years_min":8,"visa_sponsorship":false,"relocation_package":false,"has_equity":false,"technologies":[{"name":"AI Agents","optional":false},{"name":"Anomaly Detection","optional":false},{"name":"Edge AI","optional":false},{"name":"Physical AI","optional":false},{"name":"Reinforcement Learning","optional":false},{"name":"Reinforcement Learning","optional":false},{"name":"Agile","optional":true},{"name":"Motion Planning","optional":true},{"name":"Quantization","optional":true}],"status":"live","first_seen_at":"2026-08-27T18:31:28Z","employer_posted_date":"2026-10-10","last_verified_at":"2026-10-17T22:39:39Z","board_verified":true,"closed_at":null,"days_open":51,"trust":{"level":"ok","repost_count":0,"flags":["company_stale"],"days_open":50},"description":"Space is a warfighting domain. True Anomaly seeks those with the talent and ambition to build the technology that secures it.\nOUR MISSION\nTrue Anomaly delivers decisive capabilities for space superiority. We build autonomous spacecraft, advanced payloads, mission software, and space-based interceptors - enabling the U.S. and its Allies to secure the space environment and counter threats from the ultimate high ground.\nOUR VALUES\nBe the offset. We create asymmetric advantages with creativity and ingenuity.\nWhat would it take? We challenge assumptions to deliver ambitious results.\nIt’s the people. Our team is our competitive advantage and we are better together.\nBENEFITS & PERKS*\nBest-in-class healthcare: 100% company-paid medical, dental, and vision coverage for you and your dependents, with HSA/HRA options\n Generous time off: Flexible Time Off (FTO) for exempt employees, accrued PTO of up to 25 days for non-exempt employees, plus 12 paid holidays; Parental Leave; Sick Leave\nFuel for your day: Daily catered lunch and unlimited snacks for in-office employees\n And more: 401(k) retirement plan, fitness reimbursement, and Dog Fridays\nEquity participation: Equity is included as part of our total compensation package, giving you an opportunity to share in the company’s success.\n*Do not apply to fixed term and temporary roles\nYOUR MISSION\nAs Engineering Manager, Autonomy, you will build and lead a team of autonomy engineers who develop multi-agent resource allocation systems and edge-deployed physical AI capabilities for spacecraft operations. You will be responsible for team growth, performance, and delivery while ensuring alignment with the broader autonomy roadmap spanning constellation scheduling, onboard replanning, and distributed coordination. You will translate technical vision into execution, develop talent, and create the processes and culture that enable your team to deliver validated, rugged autonomy systems that operate under compute and latency constraints and evolve through continuous learning. Your primary focus is people leadership, with technical contributions focused on strategic direction, architecture reviews, and maintaining credibility with your team.\nRESPONSIBILITIES\nTechnical Oversight & Strategic Contributions\nProvide technical direction on multi-agent coordination architectures, edge deployment strategies, and validation approaches for constrained optimization problems in spacecraft operations\nReview and approve technical designs for combinatorial optimization algorithms, stochastic planning systems, and distributed coordination protocols\nParticipate in all aspects of a project's development lifecycle, including design, implementation, and verification. Lead the team by example, setting the standard for technical work (approximately 35% of time)\nDefine autonomy standards, explainability requirements, and validation approaches that enable deployment in high-stakes environments\nDrive technical decisions on compute allocation, edge optimization strategies, and real-time performance trade-offs\nMaintain technical credibility in operations research, reinforcement learning, and edge AI deployment\nStrategic Planning & Execution\nDefine and own the team roadmap in collaboration with autonomy leadership, balancing near-term delivery (flight demonstrations, customer test campaigns) with long-term capability development (continuous learning, end-to-end neural planning)\nTranslate organizational strategy and technical vision into actionable team objectives aligned to customer missions\nPrioritize work across competing demands: scheduling system maturation, edge autonomy for proximity operations, multi-spacecraft coordination, anomaly detection agents\nManage dependencies and coordinate with hardware, trajectory planning, and flight software teams to ensure successful cross-functional delivery\nTrack and communicate team progress, risks, and blockers to leadership and stakeholders with focus on demonstration readiness and customer deliverables\nDrive continuous improvement in team processes, tools, and workflows to increase velocity from prototype to production-ready systems\nWork with technical program managers to scope projects, estimate timelines, and commit to deliverables\nTeam Leadership & People Management\nBuild, grow, and lead a team of autonomy engineers through recruiting, hiring, onboarding, and retention\nProvide direct people management including 1-on-1s, performance reviews, goal setting, and career development\nFoster a culture of technical excellence, rigorous evaluation, and rapid iteration from concept to flight\nDevelop individual contributors into technical leaders through mentorship, coaching, and growth opportunities\nManage team dynamics, resolve conflicts, and ensure healthy team communication and collaboration\nFacilitate knowledge sharing, cross-training, and documentation practices to build team resilience and institutional knowledge\nBridge air domain autonomy expertise with space domain constraints (orbital mechanics, communication latency, compute/power budgets)\nQUALIFICATIONS\nEducation: Master's degree in computer science, aerospace engineering, robotics, applied mathematics, operations research, or related technical field; Ph.D. or Bachelor's degree with equivalent professional experience also accepted\nExperience: 8+ years of experience in autonomous systems, robotics, AI/ML, or aerospace engineering with at least 4 years in people management, leading teams of 4+ engineers\nPeople Management: Demonstrated track record of building, growing, and developing high-performing engineering teams including hiring, performance management, and career development\nLeadership: Proven ability to lead through influence, manage stakeholder expectations, drive execution in ambiguous environments, and deliver results through others\n Technical Foundation: Strong foundation in autonomous systems with depth in areas such as multi-agent coordination, combinatorial optimization, reinforcement learning, or constrained planning (sufficient to provide technical oversight and credibility)\nDomain Knowledge: Experience with real-time planning systems, resource-constrained deployment, or aerospace applications where autonomy operates under strict compute, latency, and power constraints\nCommunication: Exceptional written and verbal communication skills with ability to influence senior leadership, translate between technical and non-technical audiences, and represent the team effectively\nStrategic Thinking: Ability to translate organizational objectives into team strategy, prioritize competing demands, and make trade-offs that balance technical excellence with delivery\nProcess & Execution: Track record of defining processes, establishing team norms, and driving execution excellence in fast-paced environments\nCollaboration: Strong cross-functional collaboration skills with ability to build relationships, resolve conflicts, and drive consensus across hardware, software, and trajectory planning teams\nClearance: U.S. Citizen and eligible for government security clearance\nPREFERRED SKILLS AND EXPERIENCE\nExperience managing geographically distributed or hybrid teams\nExperience managing teams through full product development lifecycles from early prototypes through operational deployment\nTrack record delivering complex, multi-quarter initiatives requiring coordination across multiple teams and hardware/software integration\nExperience with agile methodologies, sprint planning, and iterative delivery in engineering environments\nBackground in autonomous aerospace systems: UAVs, spacecraft autonomy, robotic systems, or similar applications\nDeep experience with operations research: mixed-integer programming, constraint satisfaction, graph optimization, auction algorithms, or task allocation\nBackground in multi-agent reinforcement learning: MARL, policy learning, reward shaping, credit assignment, or cooperative game theory\nExperience with edge AI deployment: model compression, quantization, inference optimization, embedded ML systems, or real-time neural network execution\nBackground in stochastic optimization, robust planning under uncertainty, or Monte Carlo methods for decision-making\nExperience with trajectory optimization, motion planning, or sequential decision-making in constrained environments\nPrior work with hierarchical planning systems, temporal reasoning, or hybrid discrete-continuous optimization\nBackground partnering with product management to define requirements and prioritize features based on technical leverage\nExperience with resource planning, capacity modeling, and headcount justification\nPrior work bridging research prototypes (ICAPS/NeurIPS-quality) to production systems with emphasis on scalability and reliability\nCOMPENSATION\nBase Salary: $205,000 to $315,000 \nEquity + Benefits including Health, Dental, Vision, HRA/HSA options, PTO and paid holidays, 401K, Parental Leave \nYour actual level and base salary will be determinedon a case-by-case basis and may vary based on the following considerations: job-related knowledge and skills, education, location, and experience. \nADDITIONAL REQUIREMENTS\nWork Location -Successful candidates will be located near Denver, CO or Long Beach, CA.\nWork environment -the work environment; temperature, noise level, inside or outside, or other factors that will affect the person's working conditions while performing the job.\nPhysical demands -the physical demands of the job, including bending, sitting, lifting and driving.\nThis position will be open until it is successfully filled. To submityour application, please follow the directions below.\n#LI-Onsite \nTo conform to U.S. Government space technology export regulations, including the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) you must be a U.S. citizen, lawful permanent resident of the U.S., protected individual as defined by 8 U.S.C. 1324b(a)(3), or eligible to obtain the required authorizations from the U.S. Department of State.\nTrue Anomaly is committed to equal employment opportunity on any basis protected by applicable state and federal laws. If you have a disability or additional need that requires accommodation, please do not hesitate to let us know.\nTo protect candidates and our company from application fraud and impersonation, we use third-party tools to verify applicant identity and detect fraudulent applications. 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