Principal Engineer Systems or Sr. Principal Systems Engineer at Northrop Grumman
Colorado Springs, CO
$103,600–$193,900from the description
Jul 9, 2026
Colorado Springs, CO
Jul 21, 2026
What this job asks for AI summary
A systems engineering role embedded within an Integrated Product Team focused on radar, site activation, or compute systems. Day-to-day work centers on managing and tracing requirements through the full development lifecycle, conducting trade studies, supporting integration and verification activities, and preparing documentation for formal program reviews. Suits engineers with hands-on experience in requirements management, cross-functional IPT collaboration, and Agile development practices.
Senior level · 5+ years · Colorado Springs, CO · Bachelor's required · Secret clearance · Full-time
Advertised as Principal, but the requirements read as Senior.
“or” means any one of them counts — you don't need all of them.
We read this from the posting text with AI. Skim the description below before ruling yourself out.
How this req sits in the market our data
Rare in this occupation — lead with these, and say what you built with them.
What the occupation pays Median $112,511 (middle half $80,144–$140,023). This posting is about at that midpoint.
Estimated from BLS employment for this occupation and area, per-skill prevalence across our listing corpus, and published wage benchmarks — as of Jul 28, 2026. It is a model, not a headcount.
Why we read it this way (8)
This role is a Systems Engineer focused on radar/compute IPTs within a defense program — it does not map cleanly to a single BLS computer/mathematical SOC. 15-1299 (Computer Occupations, All Other) is used as the closest fit; 15-1211 (Computer Systems Analysts) is a plausible alternative given the requirements analysis and lifecycle focus.
The posting advertises two levels simultaneously: Principal (5+ years with BS) and Sr. Principal (8+ years with BS). The minimum experience gate is 5 years, so the overall years minimum is set to 5. The salary range spans both levels ($103,600–$193,900).
The level advertised in the title is set to Principal because that is the lower of the two explicitly named title levels in the posting title; the actual scope and experience requirements support a Senior band classification.
A STEM Bachelor's degree is the minimum hard-required credential (with Masters/PhD accepted as alternatives with fewer years). The degree requirement is set to Bachelors accordingly.
Atlassian tools (Jira, Confluence) are listed together in the requirements section; Jira is used as the primary skill name with Confluence in alternatives.
Preferred qualifications include MBSE experience (Cameo) and familiarity with PLM tools (Windchill/Teamcenter) and compute/hypervisor/network engineering — all marked as preferred.
An active U.S. Government Secret clearance is explicitly required at time of application.
Requires a 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.
Read the full posting
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