Director, Systems Engineering & Architecture - Hivemind Enterprise
Shield AI · San Diego, CA
- Level
- Director+
- Team
- Manufacturing
- Degree
- Preferred
- Experience asked
- 15+ years
- Industry
- Aerospace & defense
- Posted
- Yesterday
The role in 30 seconds
A director-level manufacturing role at Shield AI (aerospace & defense) in San Diego, CA.
- They ask for
- 15+ years · degree preferred
- Tools it names
- Validation (IQ/OQ/PQ), Robotics
Read from the posting. The full description is below.
From the plant jobs report · week of November 2, 2026
Manufacturing Engineer roles in California: typical posted base $111k–$173k.
Median of the low and high ends of 175 live postings that list pay, out of 446 manufacturing engineer openings in California, read from manufacturers' own careers sites.
California plant jobs report →Pay by team and state →What moves pay →
How this role compares
Against 445 other live manufacturing postings in California.
- Base pay
- Not listed in this posting
- Experience asked
- More than usual (15+ vs 5+)
Typical $109k–$164k, from 155 postings that list pay.
Similar roles usually ask 5+ years.
Skills these teams ask for most
- Tooling 51%
- New product launch 45%
- Root cause 39%
- Automation 35%
- Machining 27%
- ✓ Validation (IQ/OQ/PQ) 26%
✓ = this posting asks for it too. % = share of similar postings that mention it.
At a glance
Pulled from the posting text. If it's not listed here, the posting didn't say.
How to get in at this plant
Five moves over a week or two. The first one takes ten minutes.
- 1
Pick 2–3 people on the Manufacturing team at Shield AI
Engineers who joined in the last year or two reply the most. Use the team search on this page to find them.
- 2
Send a short, curious note
One real question about their work. No favors yet. Each person gets a different note, written for this role.
- 3
Turn a reply into a short call
Questions worth asking about this team:
- What does a normal week look like on your team?
- Is the work mostly new product launches or sustaining existing lines?
- How much time do you spend on the floor versus at a desk?
- How did you land the job? What stood out in your interviews?
- 4
Apply with someone vouching for you
If the call went well, ask whether they’d pass your résumé to the hiring manager. Send your résumé link, apply that day, and let them know.
- 5
Bring proof to the interview
One page of before-and-after numbers from projects you led: scrap, OEE, cycle time, cost. Plant managers hire on results.
This plant: Shield AI in San Diego
1 other open role at this site.
- Engineering Manager, Air Vehicle Mechanical Systems (R5391) · Reliability · Manager
Full description from Shield AIAs posted on their careers site.ShowHide
What You'll Do
- ◆Lead the team: Hire, develop, and lead the SE&A engineering disciplines, establishing clear responsibilities, technical standards, and effective cross-functional partnerships.
- ◆Establish the operating model: Define how SE&A engages with product and engineering teams, prioritizes competing demands, and allocates resources. Establish clear decision rights, escalation paths, and risk-proportionate engineering practices that improve delivery without unnecessary process overhead.
- ◆Own
requirements
and architecture: Guide
requirements
development and management, system modeling, architectural trade studies, interface definition, traceability, and change impact analysis.
- ✓Drive verification and validation planning: Establish system-level verification and validation strategies, measurable acceptance criteria, and evidence expectations. Partner with integration and test teams to demonstrate end-to-end capability.
- ✓Support software development: Integrate systems engineering and architecture into iterative planning, design, implementation, testing, release readiness, and sustainment.
- ✓Lead integrated assurance: Ensure cybersecurity, safety, and airworthiness considerations shape requirements, architecture, development, and verification from the outset.
- ✓Guide technical decisions: Lead risk-based design reviews, resolve cross-team technical issues, and provide evidence-based readiness recommendations while preserving designated approval and risk-acceptance authorities.
- ✓Improve engineering effectiveness: Establish and continuously improve practical methods, models, and workflows that connect requirements, architecture, implementation, and evidence. Measure success through earlier risk discovery, reduced rework, improved integration and release predictability, and timely closure of verification and assurance gaps.
requirements
development and management, including decomposition, allocation, traceability, interface requirements, baselining, and change control.
- ✓Architecture and modeling: Demonstrated ability to develop system architectures and use system models to analyze structure, behavior, interfaces, constraints, and design tradeoffs.
- ✓Verification and validation: Experience defining verification methods, measurable acceptance criteria, representative validation scenarios, and the evidence needed to assess system readiness.
- ✓Software lifecycle support: Experience applying systems engineering within software development lifecycles, including iterative development, continuous integration, testing, configuration management, and release processes.
- ✓Engineering effectiveness: Demonstrated ability to improve engineering maturity in an iterative development environment, tailoring rigor to technical risk and achieving measurable delivery benefits rather than process adoption alone.
- ✓Technical judgment: Ability to lead specialists across cybersecurity, safety, and airworthiness disciplines and communicate technical decisions and risks clearly to engineering, executive, and customer stakeholders.
- ✓Autonomous systems: Experience with autonomy software, AI-enabled systems, robotics, mission systems, or autonomy development platforms and tools.
- ✓A Degree in a relevant engineering or computer science discipline, or equivalent practical experience; an advanced technical degree is a plus
Experience That Will Help You Stand Out
- ✓Engineering methods: Experience applying model-based systems engineering (MBSE) and scaling engineering practices without unnecessary process overhead. Familiarity with SysML and Cameo or similar system modeling tools.
- ✓Aerospace and defense: Experience delivering aerospace or defense systems with government customers, platform integrators, or operational users.
- ✓Safety and airworthiness: Practical experience with safety-critical development, hazard analysis, airworthiness planning, and compliance or certification evidence.
- ✓Applied cybersecurity: Experience translating threat assessments and security obligations into requirements, architectural controls, and verification activities.
Show full description ↓Show less ↑
Shield AI is a venture-backed defense-tech company with the mission of protecting service members and civilians with intelligent systems. Its products include Hivemind autonomy software, V-BAT and X-BAT aircraft, and Aechelon simulation and synthetic reality technologies. With offices and facilities across the U.S., Europe, the Middle East, and Asia-Pacific, Shield AI’s technology actively supports operations worldwide. For more information, visit www.shield.ai. Follow Shield AI on LinkedIn, X, Instagram, and YouTube.
What You'll Bring
- •At least 15 years of applied systems engineering experience with complex, multidisciplinary systems, including direct involvement in development, integration, verification, and delivery.
- •Leadership: Demonstrated success leading engineering teams and senior technical talent, setting technical direction, and driving execution across organizational boundaries.
