SlipstreamJobs tracks this role from the company's public career site. Apply directly on the employer's site.
Hadrian is building autonomous factories to reindustrialize America by combining AI, advanced software, robotics, and full-stack manufacturing for aerospace and defense customers. The company recently raised $1.37B in Series D funding at a $7.87B valuation and is rapidly expanding manufacturing capabilities across welding, casting, forging, electronics, and additive manufacturing.
The Forward Deployed team embeds engineers directly on Hadrian's largest, most critical programs with the U.S. Government, Armed Forces, and major defense primes. As Director of Engineering for Forward Deployed, you will lead the technical side of one or more programs and own their technical outcomes. You'll work directly with government stakeholders, customer leadership, and Hadrian's executive team on multi-billion-dollar programs.
Key responsibilities include:
- Owning the technical roadmap and delivery for programs, from initial scoping through production. You decide what Hadrian's Opus AI platform covers, what gets built custom, and what to decline, while maintaining a high execution bar.
- Bringing program learnings back to platform teams to improve Hadrian's product for all customers and determining which Forward Deployed solutions should become part of Opus.
- Serving as the primary technical contact for customer program leadership, government stakeholders, and prime partners. You run technical reviews, manage scope and schedule conversations, and make trade-off calls when commercial stakes are real.
- Building and leading your team of engineers, product managers, and designers. You set working standards and help them navigate their hardest decisions.
- Staying hands-on technically—from building v0 yourself early in a program to closely reviewing team work to ensure it meets Hadrian's quality bar.
You'll be working on critical national security and industrial programs where speed and quality directly impact mission success. The role offers the opportunity to shape how America manufactures mission-critical systems like rockets, satellites, aircraft, and ships.
REQUIREMENTS:
- Demonstrated history leading engineering and product teams, with experience scaling products from zero to one.
- Strong commercial acumen and excellent product judgment.
- Proven ability to manage senior customer relationships and make commitments on behalf of a company that you then delivered on.
- Hands-on technical skills: comfortable with architecture, code review, and shipping end-to-end.
- AI-native mindset: you use AI to compress discovery and execution, can demonstrate concrete productivity gains, and have rebuilt team workflows around AI.
- Experience hiring builders into ambiguous roles and getting them productive quickly.
- Driven by mission and tempo; rebuilding the industrial base matters to you.
- U.S. citizenship or national status, lawful permanent resident, or eligible to obtain ITAR authorizations from the U.S. Department of State (required for export compliance).
SETTING YOU APART:
- Founder or founding-team experience, especially with customer relationships and business decisions while still building.
- Background in aerospace, defense, manufacturing, or roles where hardware, software, and operations intersect.
- Prior forward-deployed or solutions engineering leadership at a product company.
