Director of Structures and Mechanisms
Location: Playa Vista, California (in-person, five days per week)
About Outpost
Launch has changed the economics of space. Now it is time to return. Outpost is building the missing infrastructure between orbit and Earth: reusable vehicles that bring payloads back from space and deliver them to a precise location within hours, exologistics at planetary scale. Core technologies are advancing toward flight readiness, and we've validated demand through multiple defense and civil agreements with a growing commercial pipeline. We're scaling rapidly, this is the point where execution and scale define the outcome.
The Role
The Director of Structures and Mechanisms is the executive technical leader for all primary structures, secondary structures, and deployable mechanisms across Outpost's Carryall vehicle. This role combines deep structural engineering expertise with leadership you will build, scale, and lead a multi-disciplinary team of structures, mechanisms, and mechanical engineers while owning the architecture, analysis, qualification, and flight certification of the entire structural system.
Unlike traditional space vehicle roles where the structure simply needs to survive launch, you are designing for the round trip: launch vibration, the harsh vacuum of orbit, and the extreme thermal and mechanical loads of hypersonic re-entry and landing. You will own the technical execution of every structural element on the vehicle, with full accountability to executive leadership for overall flight readiness. We need a proven leader with the deep intuition that comes from seeing hardware fly (and fail), and the management experience to scale a world-class team around that expertise.
Responsibilities
- Build, grow, and lead the Structures & Mechanisms organization. Recruit, mentor, and develop engineers across multiple sub-disciplines (primary structure, mechanisms, TPS, analysis)
- Serve as the final sign-off for the structural architecture of the vehicle, including primary structure, interfaces to the deployable heatshield, secondary structures, deployable mechanisms, and payload bay
- Partner cross-functionally to resolve system-level trades. Represent Structures in executive reviews, customer milestone reviews, and with government stakeholders
- Establish and enforce analysis standards across the team — hand calculations, FEA (ANSYS/FEMAP/NASTRAN), stiffness, buckling, fatigue, and thermal expansion compatibility. Be the final technical check on margin policy and verification logic
- Own the release process and quality bar for mechanical manufacturing drawings and geometric dimensioning and tolerancing (ASME Y14.5) across the department
- Coordinate with the production team on structural qualification campaign end-to-end — static load, random vibration, shock, deployment, and environmental testing — to certify hardware for flight.
- Coordinate with the production team to stablish strategic relationships with machine shops, composite vendors, and external partners. Support make-vs-buy decisions and ensure supply chain resilience for precision flight hardware.
- Brief the CEO, board, customers, and government partners on structural design, risk posture, and program status.
Qualifications
- Bachelor's degree or higher in Mechanical, Aerospace, or Structural Engineering
- 10+ years of experience in the design and analysis of complex aerospace structures and mechanisms, with at least 3+ years in a management or technical leadership role leading multi-disciplined engineering teams.
- Proven track record leading structures on full space vehicles or rockets (not just subsystems)
- Demonstrated experience hiring, scaling, and mentoring engineering teams of 5+ engineers; comfortable setting OKRs, running performance reviews, and managing costs
- Expert-level fluency in Siemens NX, SolidWorks, or similar parametric modeling software, with the ability to drive standards across the team
- Deep background in structural analysis (FEA) and classical hand calculations. You must trust your hand calcs before you trust the solver
- Extensive understanding of aerospace materials (aluminum, titanium, inconel, composites) and their behavior in extreme thermal environments
- Deep command of CNC machining, sheet metal, and welding with a design-for-manufacturing mindset you can instill across the org
Preferred Experience
- Active U.S. Government Security Clearance (not required, but beneficial)
- Experience with deployable space structures and mechanisms (booms, solar arrays, antennas, or aerobrakes)
- Experience in taking primary structure from concept through PDR/CDR to flight
- Experience designing for high-heat environments or integrating with Thermal Protection Systems (TPS)
- Deep knowledge of aerospace standards (NASA-STD-5000 series, SMC-S-016) for structural margins and testing
- Prior experience as a Director, Chief Engineer, or department head at a launch, reentry, satellite, or hypersonics company
Compensation & Benefits
- $165,000 – $220,000; Salary may vary with experience
- Annual Performance-Based Bonus
- Medical, Dental, and Vision Insurance
- Short- and Long-Term Disability Insurance
- Subsidized daily catered lunch, snacks, and coffee
