Northrop Grumman logo

Principal Systems Engineer 3

Northrop Grumman

San Diego, CAJob$114–171K/yrSeen 4 days agoSeen in employer's feed 4 days ago

Most applications go out cold — see where you stand first. No sign-up to start.

You apply on the employer's site, with no Olive account needed.

Watch jobs like this.

Don't just apply. Show up ready.

Olive works from this exact posting.

At a glance

Compensation
$114–171K/yr
Location
San Diego, CA
Work Authorization
US work authorization required

Olive lists jobs from US employers, including remote roles you can work from the United States.

Requirements

Credentials this posting asks for.

Secret clearance

Job overview

Northrop Grumman seeks a Requirements Engineer to support the AISR&T program in Rancho Bernardo, California. The role focuses on end-to-end requirements engineering for mission-critical airborne ISR and tactical systems, ensuring stakeholder needs are defined, traceable, and verified. The engineer will work with customers, program leadership, technical teams, and test and integration teams, with on-site presence required for classified work, integration events, and technical reviews.

Skills & qualifications

RequiredNice to have

Skills

Requirements EngineeringAnalytical SkillsOrganizational SkillsCommunicationCross-Functional TeamworkAirborne ISRMission SystemsTactical CommunicationsComplex Systems RequirementsModel-Based Systems EngineeringMIL-STDsInterface StandardsSecurity/Cyber RequirementsDOORSDOORS NextJamaCameo/MBSERequirements Practices

Qualifications

BS in STEM or MS in STEMBS+5 or MS+3 Years Engineering ExperienceDoD Secret Clearance

Benefits

Relocation Assistance
Medical Insurance
Paid Time Off

Full job description

RELOCATION ASSISTANCE: Relocation assistance may be available

CLEARANCE REQUIRED FOR START: No

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.

Aeronautics Systems is seeking a Requirements Engineer to support the AISR&T program in Rancho Bernardo, CA .

The selected candidate will focus on end-to-end requirements engineering: eliciting, analyzing, documenting, and managing system and subsystem requirements for mission-critical airborne ISR and tactical systems. This role is key to ensuring that stakeholder needs are clearly defined, traceable, and successfully verified.

Responsibilities

  • Lead and perform requirements engineering activities across the full lifecycle (decomposition, analysis, documentation, allocation, traceability, change management, verification, and validation).

  • Work directly with customers, program leadership, and technical teams to capture and clarify operational concepts, use cases, and stakeholder needs.

  • Develop and maintain system and subsystem requirements specifications, interface control documents (ICDs), and related engineering artifacts.

  • Establish and maintain bidirectional traceability between stakeholder requirements, system requirements, design elements, and test cases in the chosen requirements management tools.

  • Support architecture and design efforts by ensuring requirements are well-structured, testable, and aligned to program constraints and objectives.

  • Drive requirements baselining and change control processes; assess the impact of requirement changes on cost, schedule, and technical performance.

  • Collaborate with test and integration teams to define verification methods (analysis, test, inspection, demonstration) and ensure requirements are fully verified and validated.

Basic Qualifications

  • BS degree in a STEM discipline with 5 years of engineering experience OR Master’s degree in a STEM discipline with 3 years

  • Ability to obtain and maintain DoD Secret clearance

  • Strong analytical, organizational, and communication skills, with the ability to work effectively on cross-functional teams.

Preferred Qualifications

  • Experience on airborne ISR, mission systems, or tactical communications programs.

  • Hands-on experience defining and managing requirements for complex, multi-disciplinary systems (software, hardware, network, and integration).

  • Experience with Model-Based Systems Engineering (MBSE) approaches and tools.

  • Familiarity with government or industry standards relevant to AISR&T (e.g., MIL-STDs, interface standards, security/cyber requirements).

  • Familiarity with requirements management tools (e.g., DOORS, DOORS Next, Jama, Cameo/MBSE) and standard requirements practices.

Work Environment

  • Primary work location: Rancho Bernardo, CA.

On-site presence required to support classified work, integration events, and technical reviews; some travel may be required for program or customer meetings.

Primary Level Salary Range: $114,000.00 - $171,000.00

The above salary range represents a general guideline; however, Northrop Grumman considers a number of factors when determining base salary offers such as the scope and responsibilities of the position and the candidate's experience, education, skills and current market conditions.

Depending on the position, employees may be eligible for overtime, shift differential, and a discretionary bonus in addition to base pay. Annual bonuses are designed to reward individual contributions as well as allow employees to share in company results. Employees in Vice President or Director positions may be eligible for Long Term Incentives. In addition, Northrop Grumman provides a variety of benefits including health insurance coverage, life and disability insurance, savings plan, Company paid holidays and paid time off (PTO) for vacation and/or personal business.

The application period for the job is estimated to be 20 days from the job posting date. However, this timeline may be shortened or extended depending on business needs and the availability of qualified candidates.

Northrop Grumman is an Equal Opportunity Employer, making decisions without regard to race, color, religion, creed, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status, national origin, age, veteran status, disability, or any other protected class. For our complete EEO and pay transparency statement, please visit http://www.northropgrumman.com/EEO. U.S. Citizenship is required for all positions with a government clearance and certain other restricted positions.

Job Category: Engineering

How this job compares

Set against the 11,457 open Systems Engineer jobs on Olive Jobs, counted November 3, 2026.

Pay
  • This posting$114–171K/yr
  • California median$143–211K/yr1,746 salary ranges
  • US median$116–190K/yr8,475 salary ranges

This range's midpoint, $143K, is 19% below the California median midpoint ($176K) — in the lowest quarter of Systems Engineer salary ranges in California.

Openings
Olive Jobs lists 2,057 open Systems Engineer jobs in California and 11,457 across the US. 5% of them nationwide are listed as remote or flexible.
Hiring the most in California
Experience
This posting asks for at least 3 years of experience; Systems Engineer postings that state a minimum ask for 5 years at the median (9,561 postings).
Education
4,551 of the 11,457 open Systems Engineer jobs (40%) ask for a bachelor's degree or higher.

Counted across the open, public US postings on Olive Jobs on November 3, 2026. Pay medians are the middle values of the low ends and of the high ends of postings that list both ends of a range in the same cadence (a yearly salary or an hourly rate); a range's midpoint is halfway between its ends. Pay and experience figures resting on fewer than 20 postings are left out.

Prepare for this role

You've read the whole posting — now see how you match it.