Principal Systems Engineer - Requirements & Verification at Northrop Grumman
San Diego, CA
$114,000–$171,000from the description
Jun 30, 2026
San Diego, CA
Jul 21, 2026
What this job asks for AI summary
A systems engineering role focused on requirements definition, verification, and integration testing for complex aerospace hardware and software systems. Day-to-day work spans writing and tracing requirements, developing interface definitions, conducting integration testing, and supporting flight test activities across the full engineering lifecycle. Suited to STEM-credentialed engineers with systems engineering experience and an active Top Secret clearance.
Senior level · 5+ years · San Diego-Chula Vista-Carlsbad, CA · Bachelor's required · Top Secret clearance · Full-time
Advertised as Principal, but the requirements read as Senior.
We read this from the posting text with AI. Skim the description below before ruling yourself out.
Why we read it this way (8)
This role is offered at three possible locations: San Diego, CA; El Segundo, CA; and Palmdale, CA. The CBSA is set to San Diego-Chula Vista-Carlsbad, CA as the first-listed location; El Segundo falls within the Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA CBSA (31080) and Palmdale within the Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario, CA CBSA (40140).
The posting title uses 'Principal' as an internal Northrop Grumman career-level label (common at defense primes), not the industry-standard Staff/Principal band. The actual experience gate is 5 years with a BS, 3 years with an MS, or 1 year with a PhD — scope and requirements support a Senior classification.
The Top Secret clearance is an explicit hard gate ('Must have an active U.S. Government Top Secret Clearance or higher'). The additional SAP clearance is required to obtain within a reasonable time but is not required at start; the posting separately notes 'Current SAP clearance to program' as a preferred qualification.
The role is primarily a Systems Engineering / Requirements Engineering discipline role (requirements decomposition, verification, traceability, integration planning) rather than a pure software development or IT operations role. SOC 15-1299 (Computer Occupations, All Other) is the closest fit; 15-1211 (Computer Systems Analysts) is a reasonable runner-up given the systems analysis and requirements work.
Skills such as 'requirements management', 'requirements verification', 'systems engineering lifecycle', and 'integration and test' are domain methodologies rather than named tools, but they are explicitly called out as hard gates in the Basic Qualifications section and are the core competencies being hired for, so they are retained here as required skills.
DOORS and Atlassian Tool Suite, Agile Design Methodology, and ICD development experience all appear under the Preferred Qualifications section.
Ignored 3 non-technology phrase(s) as skills (responsibilities/concepts, not named tools): requirements management, systems engineering lifecycle, ICD development.
Requires a Top Secret clearance — the cleared population is a small fraction of this occupation, so the real candidate pool is materially smaller than the estimate below, which does not model clearance.
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