Sr. Engineering Manager, Autonomy and Executive Reasoning (R2424)
Shield AI
Software Engineering, Other Engineering
San Diego, CA, USA · San Diego, CA, USA · Oregon, USA
Posted on Feb 13, 2025
Founded in 2015, Shield AI is a venture-backed defense technology company with the mission of protecting service members and civilians with intelligent, autonomous systems. Its products include Hivemind Enterprise—EdgeOS, Pilot, Commander, and Forge—as well as V-BAT and Sentient Vision Systems (wide-area motion imaging software). With offices in San Diego, Dallas, Washington, D.C., Abu Dhabi (UAE), Kyiv (Ukraine), and Melbourne (Australia), Shield AI’s technology actively supports U.S. and allied operations worldwide. For more information, visit www.shield.ai. Follow Shield AI on LinkedIn, X and Instagram.
The Hivemind Pilot team is an agile group of engineers focused on building a state-of-the-artAutonomy Software Development Kit (SDK) that enables resilient autonomy and intelligence for a wide range of platforms in diverse environments. The Executive Reasoning team in Pilot is responsible for enabling executive decision making by an agent or team-of-agents toward achieving complex and diverse missions. Capabilities to enable mission decomposition, task assignment and scheduling across teams of agents, contingency management and attrition handling are developed by this team.
As the Lead for Executive Reasoning, you will lead a group of engineers enabling execution of complex fully autonomous multi-agent missions on the edge in diverse adversarial environments. You will work closely with talented engineers to architect core systems, set standards for software engineering, drive strategic technical improvements, and mentor other engineers.
What you'll do:
- Lead the technical direction and roadmapfor a range of Cognition capabilities including but not limited to robot team management, multi-agent task assignment, task scheduling & coordination, intelligent failure handling, intelligent attrition management, and system explainability
- Enable intuitive and easy workflows for SDK customers to develop customizations and extensions to successfully achieve their autonomy objectives and aspirations
- Serve as the architect for the Executive Reasoning stack to enable modularity, correctness and extensibility
- Grow & mentor the autonomy and software engineers in the team via performance feedback, technical guidance and code reviews
- Ensure high morale and excitement in the team by connecting day-to-day efforts to the big picture, ensuring alignment of personal goals with company objectives, and actively taking steps to set them up for success
- Grow the team by identifying gaps and projecting headcount needs
- Lead planning and execution for the team to ensure informed team commitments and timely delivery of those commitments
- Work in close collaboration with other Pilot teams (State-estimation, Object tracking, Path & Motion Planning, Mapping) to ensure correctness and cohesiveness of the overall Pilot product.
- Work in collaboration with Program and Product managers to define a feasible technical roadmap for future autonomy solutions
Required Qualifications:
- M.S in Computer science, Aerospace or related engineering field
- 9+ years of experience in engineering autonomous systems or equivalent engineering roles
- 3+ years of people leadership experience leading teams of 4+ people
- Experience with path or behavior planning, motion planning or task planning
- Demonstrated ability to take ideas from academic works, and polish them to enable production ready capabilities
- Proficient in software delivery and managing execution toward tight timelines
- Proficient with C++ 11 or newer in a production environment
- Experience in a collaborative development environment, focused on continuous integration/delivery & test-driven development
- Strong knowledge of modern software engineering best practices
- Demonstrated record of working hard, strong communication skills, being a trustworthy teammate, and being kind to others
- Strong organizational skills
Preferred Qualifications:
- Experience in the autonomous vehicle industry
- Ph.D. in Computer science, or related engineering field
- 5+ years of people leadership experience
- Experience leading a team that shipped commercial grade products
- Experience in productizing prototypes into commercial products
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Full-time regular employee offer package:
Pay within range listed + Bonus + Benefits + Equity
Temporary employee offer package:
Pay within range listed above + temporary benefits package (applicable after 60 days of employment)
Salary compensation is influenced by a wide array of factors including but not limited to skill set, level of experience, licenses and certifications, and specific work location. All offers are contingent on a cleared background and possible reference check. Military fellows and part-time employees are not eligible for benefits. Please speak to your talent acquisition representative for more information.
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Shield AI is proud to be an equal opportunity workplace and is an affirmative action employer. We are committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, color, ancestry, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, age, marital status, disability, gender identity or Veteran status. If you have a disability or special need that requires accommodation, please let us know.