Ground and Control Services, Software Engineering Manager

BlackSky is a real-time intelligence company that operates a sophisticated space-based intelligence platform. They are seeking a Software Engineering Manager to lead the Ground & Control Services team, responsible for developing autonomous systems for satellite operations and ensuring operational excellence across various projects.

Responsibilities:

• Lead, mentor, and grow the Ground & Control Services engineering team responsible for autonomous satellite operations, real‑time tasking, and ground‑to‑space communications
• Work with leadership to drive prioritization and planning across GCS projects with dynamically changing commercial and program objectives, ensuring engineering efforts stay aligned with business goals, customer commitments, and mission operations
• Partner with operations, communication engineering, flight software, mission planning, product, and program leadership to clarify requirements, align priorities, and maintain a strong end‑to‑end understanding of system behavior
• Provide technical direction and architectural guidance for systems interfacing with ground stations, satellite communication protocols, and mission‑critical operational workflows
• Establish and continuously improve engineering processes including design reviews, code reviews, testing practices, system safety considerations, and operational readiness
• Foster a healthy on-call culture and ensure effective support of live operational systems, including incident response, root‑cause analysis, and long-term corrective actions
• Drive roadmap planning, resource allocation, and execution across multiple projects, balancing rapid iteration with long‑term reliability and availability
• Hire, onboard, coach, and evaluate engineers, emphasizing skill development, collaboration, and accountability
• Perform other leadership tasks as required to ensure the success of the team and mission
• Other responsibilities as assigned

Requirements:

• Bachelor's degree in computer science, engineering, or a related technical field, or equivalent practical experience
• A minimum of eight (8) years of professional experience in software engineering, including experience building or operating complex distributed, autonomous, or mission‑critical systems
• At least two (2) years of experience leading engineering teams as a people manager or technical lead with formal leadership responsibilities
• Strong technical background in one or more programming languages (e.g., Go, Python, C++), with the ability to provide architectural guidance and review complex designs
• Experience developing and deploying microservices in cloud environments (e.g., AWS, GCP, Azure) and on-premises Kubernetes‑based systems
• Solid understanding of CI/CD pipelines, automated testing strategies, version control, and operational best practices
• Demonstrated ability to manage priorities, coordinate across teams, and deliver results in fast-paced environments with operational dependencies
• Excellent communication, collaboration, and conflict‑resolution skills, especially in cross‑functional settings
• Some programs this role supports may require the candidate to be a U.S. citizen
• Master's degree (or higher) in a relevant technical field
• Ten or more years of professional engineering experience, including leadership of teams responsible for high-availability or mission-critical software
• Experience managing teams working with infrastructure‑as‑code tools (e.g., Terraform, Ansible), container orchestration (e.g., Kubernetes, Nomad), or distributed systems
• Knowledge of system safety, fault tolerance, redundancy, and recovery strategies in autonomous or operationally sensitive environments
• Background in satellite operations, ground stations, or aerospace domains (e.g., X‑Band, UHF, telemetry), or experience supporting secure customer programs
• Prior experience aligning engineering execution with both commercial production SLAs and program‑specific requirements, deliverables, or milestones