Head of project energy

We need your talent, teamwork, and energy to help us achieve great things that inspire people all over the globe. We need you to bring creative ideas and diverse backgrounds to help us envision, shape, and deliver systems that will enable the exploration of space while benefiting people here on Earth. We are excited about what we do, and we need you on our team as we take on exciting challenges for NASA’s pursuits in deep space exploration. As NASA’s largest engineering solutions provider working together with NASA at centers across the United States.

We have an exciting opportunity for a Project Manager to join the team with Aerodyne Industries, a teammate company.

We are seeking a Project Manager to lead a rapid-turn design, build, certification, test, and integration effort for a Suit Mass Simulator supporting a vehicle launch campaign planned for 2027. This project is expected to move quickly from concept refinement through hardware delivery and vehicle integration, with a near-term target of approximately five months for design maturity, fabrication, test, certification, and delivery.

The Suit Mass Simulator will represent the mass properties of the flight suit system in a stowed launch configuration and will mechanically interface with the vehicle's don/doff station. The hardware is expected to support launch-loads characterization by capturing loads/environmental data during vehicle operation. The final configuration may include mechanical mass-simulator hardware, adjustable ballast or mass-property refinement features, instrumentation, data acquisition, vehicle power interfaces, and C&DH/telemetry interfaces.

This role requires a technically fluent PM who can lead across mechanical design, electrical/avionics design, project engineering, systems engineering, test, certification, procurement, customer/interface management, and schedule execution in a highly compressed timeframe. The ideal candidate is not simply a project administrator. This role requires a PM who can understand the engineering conversation well enough to know when a mechanical design concern, avionics interface issue, certification gap, test limitation, or evolving mass-property target is becoming a project-level risk.

This person should be comfortable leading a fast-moving team where the plan is being built while the project is already in motion. They should be able to impose structure without slowing the team down, force clarity on interfaces and decision ownership, and keep the project moving toward delivery without allowing unresolved technical assumptions to quietly become schedule debt.

Lead the overall planning and execution of a quick-turn design-build-certify-integrate project supporting HLS / Blue Origin vehicle integration milestones.

Develop and maintain the integrated project plan, including scope, schedule, budget, staffing, procurement, design maturity, test readiness, certification, delivery, and integration milestones.

Coordinate project execution across mechanical design, drafting, electrical design, avionics/data acquisition, project engineering, systems engineering, test, safety/certification, and customer stakeholders.

Drive early definition and closure of project fundamentals, including team structure, funding path, interface ownership, technical authority path, certification approach, minimum viable test program, and delivery expectations.

Establish and manage the project's critical path, with particular focus on design maturity, long-lead procurements, instrumentation/DAQ approach, vehicle power and C&DH interfaces, fabrication lead times, qualification/protoqualification testing, and integration readiness.

Lead regular project status reviews, risk reviews, action tracking, interface coordination, and decision forums.

Coordinate with vehicle interface owners, suit-system stakeholders, vehicle integration teams, and internal engineering organizations to ensure project decisions remain aligned with vehicle launch and integration needs.

Ensure the mass simulator design can accommodate evolving suit mass properties, including center of gravity, moment of inertia, ballast strategy, and fidelity trade decisions.

Manage technical, schedule, cost, and interface risks associated with changing suit design data, uncertain load environments, evolving mass-property targets, and late-breaking certification or integration requirements.

Support definition of the appropriate test and certification approach, including functional testing, design review, mass-properties verification, vibration testing, data acquisition verification, and environmental test rationale.

Ensure project documentation, design artifacts, certification products, interface agreements, risk posture, and delivery records are maintained at a level appropriate for flight integration hardware.

Escalate issues early when technical uncertainty, resource gaps, funding delays, or external interface dependencies threaten the project's ability to meet delivery and integration commitments.

Typically requires a minimum of a bachelor's degree in Engineering and normally possess 5- 10 years of related experience. Demonstrated experience leading complex technical projects involving hardware design, build, test, certification, and delivery.

Experience managing rapid-turn or schedule-constrained aerospace, defense, flight hardware, test article, ground support equipment, or vehicle integration projects.

Strong technical literacy across mechanical design, electrical/avionics interfaces, instrumentation, test planning, hardware certification, and integrated system delivery.

Demonstrated ability to lead multidisciplinary teams through ambiguous early project definition while maintaining execution momentum.

Experience building and maintaining integrated schedules, risk registers, action trackers, staffing plans, and project status products for technical leadership and customer stakeholders.

Ability to manage interface-heavy projects involving multiple organizations, evolving requirements, and external customer dependencies.

Experience coordinating design reviews, test readiness reviews, certification readiness, hardware delivery, and integration planning.

Ability to identify when a project requires systems engineering discipline, project engineering ownership, formal requirements closure, or additional technical authority engagement.

Strong communication skills, including the ability to translate technical uncertainty into clear schedule, cost, risk, and decision impacts.

Demonstrated ability to operate with urgency while preserving sound engineering judgment and disciplined configuration control.​

NASA, JSC, Artemis, HLS, EVA, spacesuit, vehicle integration, or human spaceflight project experience.

Experience with loads environments, vibration testing, mass properties, CG/MOI verification, protoqualification or qualification test planning, or minimum certification approaches.

Experience coordinating vehicle power, C&DH, data acquisition, telemetry, instrumentation, or avionics interface work.

Experience working with various NASA engineering organizations and/or commercial spaceflight partners.

Experience managing projects with compressed funding windows, evolving CLIN/task-order structures, or incremental authorization to proceed.

Experience leading teams where design, procurement, test, certification, and integration activities must overlap due to schedule constraints.

Experience/familiarity within the EA-WI-023 framework for project execution. ​

Excellent personal and professional career growth

~For more information on our partnership with NASA at Johnson Space Center (JSC), please visit

Citizenship or US Permanent Residency may be a requirement for this position.

Management has the prerogative to select at any level for which the position is advertised.

Generally, an office environment, but can involve inside or outside work depending on task.

Equipment and Machines

Standard office equipment (PC, telephone, printer, etc.).

Grooming and dress must be appropriate for the position and must not impose a safety risk/hazard to the employee or others.

#The compensation range or hourly rate listed for this position is provided as a good-faith estimate of what the company intends to offer for this role at the time this posting was issued. Actual compensation may vary based on factors such as job responsibilities, education, experience, skills, internal equity, market data, applicable collective bargaining agreements, and relevant laws.

Health, dental, and vision insurance

Paid time off and holidays

Retirement benefits (including 401(k) matching)

Educational reimbursement

Employee stock purchase plan

Tax-saving options

Disability and life insurance

Positions governed by a Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA), the McNamara-O'Hara Service Contract Act (SCA), or other employment contracts may include different provisions/benefits.

Our hiring practices provide equal opportunity for employment without regard to race, sex, sexual orientation, pregnancy (including pregnancy, childbirth, breastfeeding, or medical conditions related to pregnancy, childbirth, or breastfeeding), age, ancestry, United States military or veteran status, color, religion, creed, marital or domestic partner status, medical condition, genetic information, national origin, citizenship status, low-income status, or mental or physical disability so long as the essential functions of the job can be performed with or without reasonable accommodation, or any other protected category under federal, state, or local law. Learn more about your rights under Federal laws and supplemental language at Labor Laws Posters ( .