Sr. Systems Engineer
Peraton · Chantilly, VA
$135,000–$216,000from the description
Jul 9, 2026
Chantilly, VA
Jul 21, 2026
What this job asks for AI summary
A senior systems engineering role focused on assessing technical risks, vulnerabilities, and capability gaps within national security programs. Day-to-day work involves integrating and validating end-to-end systems, producing systems engineering documentation, translating operational requirements into technical solutions, and supporting agile software development. Suited to experienced engineers holding an active TS/SCI clearance with polygraph and relevant customer-specific background.
Senior level · 12+ years · National · TS/SCI clearance · Full-time
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
Most people in this occupation already list these. Still required — just not what gets you shortlisted.
What the occupation pays Median $108,178 (middle half $84,682–$137,059). 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)
No work location is specified in the posting. Given the TS/SCI with polygraph requirement and Peraton's customer base (U.S. Intelligence Community), this role is almost certainly on-site at a classified facility, likely in the Washington D.C./Northern Virginia area, but no CBSA could be confirmed from the text.
The clearance requirement is explicitly stated as 'Active TS/SCI security clearance with relevant polygraph' — a hard gate.
Experience minimums are degree-tiered: 12 years with a BS/BA, 10 years with an MS/MA, 7 years with a Ph.D., or 16 years with no degree. The 12-year figure (lowest degree tier) is used as the overall years minimum. Because equivalent experience is accepted in lieu of a degree, no formal degree is treated as hard-required.
The posting references 'Customer specific experience' as a qualification but provides no further detail — this likely refers to prior work with the sponsoring Intelligence Community customer and cannot be mapped to a named technology or tool.
The role blends systems engineering, technical analysis, and some software development (agile framing); it is classified as Computer Systems Analysts given the dominant emphasis on feasibility studies, gap analyses, requirements translation, and systems integration rather than hands-on software development.
CI/CD is inferred from the explicit mention of 'CI' risks alongside operational and technical risks in the responsibilities section, not from a standard CI/CD pipeline context — this is a judgement call and may refer to 'Counterintelligence' in this national-security context rather than Continuous Integration. Treat with caution.
Ignored 1 non-technology phrase(s) as skills (responsibilities/concepts, not named tools): systems engineering.
Requires a TS/SCI 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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