Sr Principal Cyber Systems Engineer – X-Lab Platform Engr (26-375)

RELOCATION ASSISTANCE: No relocation assistance available

CLEARANCE REQUIRED FOR START: Yes

CLEARANCE TYPE: Secret

TRAVEL: Yes, 10% of the Time

Description

At Northrop Grumman, our employees have incredible opportunities to work on revolutionary systems that impact people's lives around the world today, and for generations to come. Our pioneering and inventive spirit has enabled us to be at the forefront of many technological advancements in our nation's history - from the first flight across the Atlantic Ocean, to stealth bombers, to landing on the moon. We look for people who have bold new ideas, courage and a pioneering spirit to join forces to invent the future, and have fun along the way. Our culture thrives on intellectual curiosity, cognitive diversity and bringing your whole self to work — and we have an insatiable drive to do what others think is impossible. Our employees are not only part of history, they're making history.

Northrop Grumman Space Systems—Missile Defense Integration offers an excellent opportunity for a Sr Principal Cyber Systems Engineer – X-Lab Platform Engineer (26-375) to join our team of skilled and diverse professionals. Based at Schriever Space Force Base, CO, this role is essential to supporting the U.S. President, the Secretary of Defense, and combatant commanders at the strategic, regional, and operational levels.

This position does not provide relocation assistance and requires on-site work with no remote options.

Position Overview:

The Command and Control, Battle Management, and Communications (C2BMC) program is a key component of the Missile Defense System. It is a vital operational system that enables the U.S. president, the Secretary of Defense, and combatant commanders at strategic, regional, and operational levels to plan ballistic missile defense operations systematically, collectively monitor the battle, and dynamically control networked sensors and weapon systems to achieve global and regional mission goals. C2BMC supports layered missile defense capabilities that enable an optimized response to threats across all ranges and flight phases. It serves as a force multiplier by networking, integrating, and synchronizing autonomous sensor and weapon systems and operations, both globally and regionally, to improve performance. C2BMC is essential for all ground and flight tests that verify and demonstrate the current and future capabilities of missile defense systems.

Senior individual contributor with technical leadership responsibility for the virtualization, container, automation, and end-user compute platforms supporting X-Lab prototype development. The role spans physical infrastructure and hypervisor through Kubernetes, CI/CD, virtual desktop delivery, and platform monitoring. Beyond hands-on engineering, the individual sets technical direction, reviews designs, mentors less-experienced engineers, and coordinates platform work that spans networks and cyber scope.

Essential Functions:

• Containers and Kubernetes: Act as the primary administrator for the container platforms, covering cluster build, upgrade, workload onboarding, and decommissioning

• Any task performed manually more than twice is a candidate for automation

• Maintain infrastructure as code in version control, with peer review required before merging

• Observability, Recovery, and Compliance

• Develop and sustain platform monitoring and alerting systems, setting thresholds based on actual operational impact and actively reducing alert noise

• The current setup includes Prometheus, Grafana, and Mattermost for alerting; similar monitoring and alerting tools are also applicable

• Own backup and recovery for virtual machine and container workloads

• Verify restores on a scheduled basis instead of assuming backup success, and keep documented recovery procedures with specified RTO and RPO

• Apply STIGs and security baselines, and remediate findings within program service levels

• Support RMF and ATO activities, including artifact generation, scan review, and POA&M remediation

• Serve as technical lead for a group of platform engineers, setting technical direction and reviewing designs before implementation begins

• Decompose complex initiatives into actionable work, provide effort estimates with stated assumptions, and support sprint and iteration planning

• Coordinate with networks, cyber, and program stakeholders on cross-team dependencies

• Coordination requests are raised early and explicitly rather than assuming ownership of another team's scope

• Own assigned initiatives from cradle to grave, including requirements, implem