Principal Innovation Engineer

In a world of possibilities, pursue one with endless opportunities. Imagine Next! At Parsons, you can imagine a career where you thrive, work with exceptional people, and be yourself. Guided by our leadership vision of valuing people, embracing agility, and fostering growth, we cultivate an innovative culture that empowers you to achieve your full potential. Unleash your talent and redefine what’s possible. Job Description: Parsons is seeking a Principal Innovation Engineer to drive applied innovation for a mission-critical global identity and mobility platform deployed across a wide range of operating environments, from remote and austere locations to high-throughput modern facilities to cloud-forward architectures . This is a hands-on senior engineering role for a technologist who can identify promising technologies, evaluate them against real operational needs, build compelling prototypes and demonstrations, and help transition the best ideas into production-ready capabilities. The right candidate will be comfortable working across software, cloud, edge systems, biometrics/peripherals, networking, resilience engineering, and operational workflows . We are looking for someone who can help ensure our platform remains modern, resilient, and visibly state-of-the-art to customers, stakeholders, and industry peers.

What you will do Identify, evaluate, and prototype new technologies that improve a globally deployed mission-critical platform

Build working demonstrations, proof-of-concepts, and pilot implementations that can be shown to internal leadership, customers, and external stakeholders

Explore innovation across areas such as: digital identity and verification

biometrics and contactless capture

edge computing and low-power deployments

resilient/offline-first operations

cloud-native modernization

analytics and AI-assisted workflows

automation and operator experience

secure peripherals and smart devices

Assess emerging commercial and open technologies for fit, maturity, operational value, security implications, and deployability

Translate innovation ideas into practical architectures that can operate in low-bandwidth environments with intermittent connectivity, power-constraints, environmental challenges, or infrastructure limitations

Assist leadership with transition from prototypes to implementation roadmaps

Produce technical trade studies, architecture recommendations, demonstration plans, and innovation briefings

Support technical presentations, showcases, and evaluations with customers, sponsors, and partners

Shape an innovation pipeline from concept to prototype to fieldable capability

Required qualifications 10+ years of experience in systems engineering, software engineering, platform engineering, or applied R&D

Demonstrated experience turning emerging technology concepts into working prototypes or production capabilities

Strong hands-on technical depth in several of the following: distributed software systems

cloud platforms, especially AWS

edge or embedded deployments

networking or hybrid connectivity

identity or security systems

biometrics or device/peripheral integration

observability or operational analytics

Experience evaluating technology not only for technical merit, but for operational realism, reliability, security, supportability, and lifecycle fit

Experience working in mission-critical, operational, public sector, regulated, or globally distributed environments

Strong communication skills with the ability to present complex ideas clearly to both engineers and non-technical decision makers

Preferred qualifications

• Experience with identity verification , biometrics , access-control , document technologies , automated gate/peripheral systems , or related domains

• Experience designing solutions for remote, austere, power-constrained, or intermittently connected environments

• Experience with Java-based distributed systems , microservices , and event-driven architectures

• Experience with AWS , Terraform , and hybrid edge/cloud architectures

• Familiarity with technologies such as MongoDB, Elasticsearch/OpenSearch, RabbitMQ/Kafka, Grafana, ELK, HashiCorp Consul, Nomad, and Vault

• Experience with AI/ML-enabled analytics , computer vision, anomaly detection, or intelligent automation

• Experience engaging with vendors, standards bodies, industry forums, or customer technical demonstrations

Why join Parsons in this role

Work on visible, high-impact innovation with real operational relevance

Help shape the future direction of a globally deployed platform operating in some of the most challenging environments

Build demonstrable capabilities that influence customer confidence, program growth, and technical direction

Operate at the intersection of edge systems, cloud, resilience, identity, security, and emerging technology

Join a team where senior engineers can take ideas from concept to showcased capability to operational adoption

Security Clearance Requirement: None

This position is part of our Federal Solutions team.

The Federal Solutions segment delivers resources to our US government customers that ensure the success of missions around the globe. Our intelligent employees drive the state of the art as they provide services and solutions in the areas of defense, security, intelligence, infrastructure, and environmental. We promote a culture of excellence and close-knit teams that take pride in delivering, protecting, and sustaining our nation's most critical assets, from Earth to cyberspace. Throughout the company, our people are anticipating what’s next to deliver the solutions our customers need now.

Salary Range: $176,900.00 - $332,400.00

We value our employees and want our employees to take care of their overall wellbeing, which is why we offer best-in-class benefits such as medical, dental, vision, paid time off, Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP), 401(k), life insurance, flexible work schedules, and holidays to fit your busy lifestyle!

Parsons is an equal opportunity employer, and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, disability, veteran status or any other protected status.

We truly invest and care about our employee’s wellbeing and provide endless growth opportunities as the sky is the limit, so aim for the stars! Imagine next and join the Parsons quest—APPLY TODAY! Parsons is aware of fraudulent recruitment practices. To learn more about recruitment fraud and how to report it, please refer to https://www.parsons.com/fraudulent-recruitment/ .