Government Programs & Proposal Lead

About Terranova

• Backed by leading deep tech VCs, Terranova builds intelligent robotic systems to terraform the Earth itself - lifting land, restoring wetlands, and protecting critical infrastructure from floods. Our mission is to preserve the built environment, create new habitats, and usher in an era of abundance. Our work supports climate resilience, disaster recovery, housing development, and defense across the United States and beyond. We’re assembling a world-class team that wants to work on something real, physical, and civilization-scale. If you want your work to reshape the world (literally), this is the place to do it.

What to Expect

• We are looking for a Government Programs & Proposal Lead to help turn Terranova’s technology into funded government programs, demonstrations, and contracts.

• This person will own the proposal process from opportunity identification through submission, evaluation, negotiation, and follow-up. You will work directly with Terranova’s founders, engineers, field operators, and external partners to translate complex technical work into clear, persuasive, and compliant government submissions.

• You will pursue opportunities across USACE, DARPA, DoD, DOE, FEMA, and other federal programs through vehicles including Commercial Solutions Openings, BAAs, OTAs, SBIR/STTR programs, grants, white papers, concept briefs, and full proposals.

• This is not a role for someone who only edits documents after the strategy has already been decided. You will help determine which opportunities Terranova pursues, shape the technical and commercial argument, define the proposed program, and drive the submission to completion.

• The upside is meaningful ownership and the opportunity to help establish Terranova as a major government technology and infrastructure partner.

Key Responsibilities

• Identify and evaluate government funding, contracting, and partnership opportunities aligned with Terranova’s technology and mission.

• Own proposal development from solicitation review through final submission, including schedules, compliance matrices, writing assignments, reviews, and supporting materials.

• Lead submissions for CSOs, BAAs, OTAs, SBIR/STTR programs, grants, RFIs, white papers, solution briefs, concept papers, quad charts, pitch decks, and full technical proposals.

• Translate complex engineering, robotics, geotechnical, field deployment, and performance data into clear, specific, mission-focused narratives.

• Work with technical and operations teams to define project scope, technical objectives, milestones, deliverables, schedules, staffing plans, budgets, and rough-order-of-magnitude pricing.

• Build a compelling argument for why Terranova’s technology addresses an urgent government capability gap and why the proposed program should be funded now.

• Ensure every submission directly responds to solicitation requirements, evaluation criteria, formatting rules, and contracting constraints.

• Coordinate inputs from engineers, founders, customers, academic collaborators, subcontractors, advisors, and external partners.

• Support government pitches, technical evaluations, site demonstrations, oral presentations, requests for clarification, and contract negotiations.

• Develop agency-specific concepts and materials that help shape customer thinking before a formal solicitation is released.

• Build Terranova’s government opportunity pipeline, proposal calendar, content library, templates, review cadence, and submission processes.

• Track submitted opportunities, agency feedback, next steps, and follow-on pathways from initial study through demonstration, procurement, and scaled deployment.

Requirements

• Exceptional technical writing, strategic judgment, and attention to detail.

• Experience leading federal government proposals, non-dilutive funding applications, or complex technical submissions from start to finish.

• Ability to understand complex engineering quickly and turn it into a clear, persuasive argument for technical and nontechnical evaluators.

• Strong project-management skills and the ability to drive multiple contributors toward a hard submission deadline.

• Experience developing project scopes, work plans, milestones, budgets, and deliverables in collaboration with technical teams.

• Comfort working directly with founders, engineers, field operators, government customers, contracting officers, and external partners.

• Ability to distinguish a technically interesting idea from a fundable government program with a defined mission need, execution plan, and measurable outcome.

• Willingness to work on-site in Berkeley, CA.

• U.S. work authorization. We cannot sponsor H-1B visas at this time.

Preferred Skills & Experience

• Experience with CSOs, BAAs, OTAs, SBIR/STTR programs, DARPA solicitations, USACE programs, or other nontraditional federal acquisition pathways.

• Working knowledge of FAR/DFARS requirements, federal contracting processes, and proposal compliance.

• Experience in defense, civil works, infrastructure, robotics, aerospace, climate resilience, geotechnical engineering, construction technology, or complex hardware.

• Experience securing government contracts, grants, demonstrations, or research partnerships for an early-stage technology company.

• Familiarity with firm-fixed-price contracts, cost proposals, ROM pricing, subcontractor coordination, and government statement-of-work development.

• Existing relationships across DoD, USACE, DARPA, DOE, FEMA, national laboratories, or other relevant federal agencies.

• Experience building a proposal or government business-development function from scratch.

Ideal Archetype

• A technically fluent proposal leader who can spend the morning interrogating engineers, the afternoon writing a three-page solution brief, and the evening rebuilding the argument because the first version was not sharp enough.

• Someone who understands that winning government work requires more than good writing. It requires choosing the right opportunity, defining the right program, anticipating evaluator concerns, and making the submission impossible to misunderstand.

• Has been trusted with high-stakes government submissions where missing a requirement, misunderstanding the customer, or delivering late was not an option.

• Can take scattered technical information, field results, diagrams, budgets, and founder ideas and turn them into one coherent case for action.

• Has enough technical depth to challenge engineers, enough commercial judgment to shape a fundable program, and enough operational force to get the submission across the finish line.

• Comes from a serious defense, aerospace, robotics, infrastructure, government contracting, or deep-tech organization. We are optimizing for aptitude, ownership, intensity, and demonstrated wins over title.