Principal/Sr Principal Project Lead

Location: Minneapolis, MN

Join our dynamic team in Minneapolis, MN, a vibrant city known for its rich cultural scene, beautiful parks, and thriving business community. Enjoy the benefits of working in a city that offers a perfect blend of urban and natural attractions.

Responsibilities

• Provide senior-level leadership for complex design-build projects, ensuring technical and programmatic success.
• Lead technical decision-making to ensure design solutions meet performance, safety, and customer requirements.
• Drive engineering trade-offs, system-level integration, and risk resolution across all disciplines.
• Direct, mentor, and coordinate engineering staff on assigned projects.
• Serve as the primary technical interface with customer stakeholders.
• Collaborate with the Project Manager to monitor and drive schedules, budgets, procurement, and task tracking.
• Anticipate technical risks and implement mitigation strategies.
• Elevate strategic or unresolved risks to the Project Executive and Vice President of Projects.
• Ensure technical and project decisions address safety, performance, cost, and schedule.
• Lead and organize technical design reviews with customers and internal teams.
• Build strong relationships with project-level customer contacts, vendors, and third-party stakeholders.
• Collaborate with shop, field, and fabrication vendor resources.
• Align project execution with corporate standards and objectives under the guidance of Company Leadership.
• Contribute to the continuous improvement of Uni-Systems' project execution methods.
• Prepare and deliver structured project reports to Company Leadership, summarizing technical progress, risks, financials, and resource needs.
• Support business development efforts by leading technical input for proposals on new work, developing scope documents, estimates, and risk assessments.

Qualifications

• BS in Mechanical, Structural, Electrical, or Controls Engineering.
• 10 years of progressively responsible experience leading large, complex design-build projects.
• Demonstrated success driving technical direction and multidisciplinary decision-making.
• Strong track record of delivering projects meeting demanding technical, schedule, and financial goals.
• Knowledge of industry standards in aerospace ground support, amusement, kinetic architecture, or other safety-critical engineered systems.
• Familiarity with Engineering and Project Management tools (SolidWorks, ANSYS, MS Project, Excel).
• Recognized technical authority with the ability to lead large teams through high-risk decisions.
• Trusted mentor who elevates others' performance and judgment.
• Results-driven, balancing innovation with disciplined execution.
• Positive influence on project team and company staff.
• Collaborative partner to Project Managers, customer stakeholders, and company leadership.
• Must be a US citizen or a US permanent resident (current Green Card holder).