Product Assurance & Safety (PA&S) Engineer

Join ESA as a Product Assurance & Safety (PA&S) Engineer within the Navigation (NAV) Product Assurance and Safety Office (TEC-QN), supporting assigned projects in the Resilience, Navigation and Connectivity (RNC) Directorate.

You will be assigned to the Navigation (NAV) Product Assurance and Safety Office (TEC-QN) and will report hierarchically to the Head of the NAV Space Segment Product Assurance and Safety Unit and functionally to the Project Manager(s) of the project(s) you support. Initially, you will support the Galileo Second Generation project.

For the maintenance of professional standards, the implementation of ESA’s general Product Assurance and Safety policy and contributions to corporate tasks such as reviews, standardisation, alerts and lessons learned, you will report to the Head of the Quality Department through the Head of the NAV Product Assurance and Safety Office.

Description

You will work as Product Assurance and Safety Engineer, supporting assigned projects and collaborating closely with project PA&S Manager(s), project teams and experts from the ESA Directorate of Technology, Engineering and Quality. When performing these tasks, you will work in close coordination with the project PA&S Manager(s) and will be supported as relevant by experts from the project team and the ESA Directorate of Technology, Engineering and Quality.

Duties

Your responsibilities will include:

• Defining or supporting the definition of general and project-specific programmatic and technical requirements in compliance with applicable product assurance and safety (PA&S) requirements, the PA&S Office’s approach and ESA PA&S policy.
• Reviewing contractors’ plans, specifications and effort proposed for implementing the project’s PA&S programme.
• Guiding and monitoring the implementation of PA&S requirements by contractors to assess performance and effectiveness, participating in project reviews and addressing preventive or corrective actions.
• Planning, coordinating and monitoring any PA&S support for the project team.
• Representing ESA in boards established for reviews, including failure reviews and test reviews, and in the disposition of non-conformances and anomalies.
• Guiding and monitoring the application and procurement of electrical, electronic and electromechanical (EEE) parts, materials and processes and controlling implementation of applicable requirements.
• Ensuring the implementation of software PA requirements.
• Ensuring the preparation of design trade-offs, analyses and reports using reliability, availability, maintainability and safety (RAMS) data to support project decisions.
• Monitoring manufacturing, integration and test activities with quality assurance audits, mandatory and key inspection points, test witnessing and configuration inspections.
• Supporting the definition of acceptance requirements, as necessary, and participating in acceptance reviews of contractually deliverable items.
• Reviewing contractors’ PA&S analyses and safety data packages, and ensuring that they are available on the planned dates to support safety review schedules, in coordination with the safety authorities.
• Providing PA&S support for project assembly, integration and verification activities.
• Providing PA&S support during launch, validation, operation and service activities, as relevant. This may involve participation in launch campaigns.
• Supporting the identification and management of lessons learned and contributing to the quality management system, as required.
• Supporting security activities as needed.

Technical competencies

• Knowledge of space product assurance, quality assurance and safety, and quality management.
• Experience in the management and monitoring of industrial activities, including participation in reviews.
• Experience with the definition and application of product assurance and safety requirements baselines, tools and methods.
• General background and specific experience in the technical domains covered by the position.
• Experience with space and commercial quality standards as well as with their implementation.

Behavioural competencies

• Result Orientation
• Operational Efficiency
• Fostering Cooperation
• Relationship Management
• Continuous Improvement
• Forward Thinking

Education and professional experience

A master's degree in an engineering subject is required for this post together with four years of relevant professional experience.

Additional requirements

Previous experience in one of the PA&S technical domains is required. Significant experience as a PA&S Engineer working on space projects involving industry and institutional partners, as well as the use of ECSS and other industrial and commercial standards in space projects, would be considered an asset.

Applicants must be eligible to access information, technology and hardware subject to European or US export control and sanctions regulations and be eligible to acquire security clearance through their national security administrations.

Note that ESA is in the process of transitioning to a Matrix setup, which could lead to organisational changes affecting this position.

Nationality and Languages

Applications are only considered from nationals of one of the following States: Austria, Belgium, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, Canada, Cyprus, Latvia, Lithuania and Slovakia.

According to the ESA Convention, staff shall be recruited on the basis of their qualifications, taking into account an adequate distribution of posts among nationals of the Member States.

The working languages of the Agency are English and French. A good knowledge of one of these is required. Knowledge of another Member State language would be an asset.