Mission Manager

Role: Northwood is looking for a Mission Manager to lead customer missions from onboarding through operational support. In this role, you will be the primary program lead for customers using Northwood’s ground station network. You will work closely with customers, Engineering, Product, Business Development, and Operations to make sure each mission is clearly scoped, technically ready, launched successfully, and supported over time.

This is a hands-on role for someone who can manage complex technical programs, communicate clearly with both customers and internal teams, and keep mission-critical work moving.

- Lead customer missions from onboarding through integration, launch readiness, operational handoff, and ongoing support.

- Build and manage program plans, including milestones, owners, risks, dependencies, schedules, readiness criteria, and communications.

- Serve as the main programmatic point of contact for customers and internal teams.

- Understand customer mission requirements, workflows, success criteria, operational needs, and constraints.

- Coordinate across Engineering, Product, Business Development, and Operations to resolve issues and keep deployments on track.

- Track technical integration progress, surface risks early, and drive decisions needed for mission readiness.

- Help define and improve Northwood’s customer onboarding, deployment, escalation, and post-launch support processes.

- Capture customer feedback and translate it into clear product, operational, and business priorities.

- Partner with Business Development on customer expansion, renewals, and new mission opportunities.

- Ensure Northwood delivers reliable, high-quality service for customer missions.

- 5+ years of experience in technical program management, mission management, customer operations, deployment management, customer success, product operations, or a related role.

- Experience leading complex cross-functional programs from planning through execution.

- Ability to work effectively with customers, technical teams, executives, and external partners.

- Ability to create structure, prioritize work, and drive progress in fast-moving environments.

- Experience with hardware, software, networking, infrastructure, customer deployments, or mission-critical operations.

- Ability to understand customer needs and translate them into clear technical, operational, and business priorities.

- Bachelor’s degree in Engineering, Computer Science, Aerospace, Business, or a related field.

- Experience in satellite communications, ground station operations, space systems, telecom, defense, or infrastructure deployments.

- Experience managing technical customer programs, enterprise deployments, customer success programs, or mission operations.

- Familiarity with systems engineering, solution architecture, operational readiness, SLA management, or mission assurance.

- Experience working with Product and Engineering teams on customer-driven roadmaps or operational improvements.

- Experience supporting government, defense, or regulated customers.

- This position requires successfully obtaining and maintaining a Top Secret Security Clearance as a condition of employment. While the clearance may not be immediately necessary upon hire, we encourage you to initiate the application process promptly upon accepting this offer. Your ability to secure the necessary clearance is essential for fulfilling key responsibilities of the role.

Should you be unable to obtain it, Northwood Space reserves the right to modify or terminate your employment to align with optional needs.

- Must be willing to work extended hours and weekends as needed

Compensation at Northwood Space is based on role, level, location, and alignment with market data. Individual base pay is determined on a case-by-case basis and may vary depending on job-related skills, education, experience, and technical expertise. Base salary is just one part of your total rewards package at Northwood.

In addition to base salary, Northwood Space offers long-term incentives such as company stock options and discretionary performance bonuses.

Benefits include equity, comprehensive medical, vision, and dental coverage, flexible spending accounts, flexible time off, 10 or more paid holidays per year, retirement savings plans, and opportunities for professional development.