Acknowledgement of Country
CSIRO acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the land, sea and waters, of the area that we live and work on across Australia. We acknowledge their continuing connection to their culture and pay our respects to their Elders past and present. View our vision towards reconciliation.
Role highlights
- Lead engineering support for the world's largest radio telescope
- Apply your RF and systems engineering expertise to complex operational challenges
- Join a globally connected team driving impactful scientific discovery!
About CSIRO
As Australia's national science agency, CSIRO is solving the greatest challenges through innovative science and technology. Many of our iconic innovations were once considered impossible until someone, just like you, joined us and took on the challenge.
Visit CSIRO.au for more information.
The opportunity
The SKA Observatory (SKAO) is delivering one of the world's most ambitious scientific projects, constructing the largest and most advanced radio telescopes ever built. In Australia, the SKA-Low telescope is being developed in partnership with CSIRO and will enable transformational science for decades to come, helping answer some of the biggest questions about our Universe.
The SKA-Low Engineering Operations team is responsible for ensuring the ongoing performance, reliability and availability of the telescope throughout its operational lifecycle. Working closely with engineers, scientists, technical specialists and operational teams across Australia and the international SKAO community, the team supports the operation, maintenance and continuous improvement of a highly complex scientific facility.
As the Lead Telescope Operations Engineer, you will provide strategic technical leadership for the operation and performance of the world's largest low-frequency radio telescope. You will lead a team of specialist engineers, oversee the investigation and resolution of complex technical issues, and play a key role in maintaining and optimising the telescope's analogue and digital signal chain. Acting as the senior operational engineering escalation point, you will guide multidisciplinary investigations, support major incident response activities, and drive initiatives that improve telescope performance, reliability and scientific outcomes.
You will bring significant experience leading multidisciplinary engineering teams and operations within a complex technical, scientific, industrial or infrastructure environment. You will have strong systems thinking, engineering judgement and experience across areas such as reliability, safety assurance, risk management and operational performance. You will also be a confident communicator who can influence across disciplines, lead technical teams through challenging problems, and apply sound engineering judgement to balance operational priorities, technical risks and long-term system performance. Experience in radio astronomy, observatory operations or another mission-critical engineering environment will be highly regarded.
If you are an accomplished engineering leader looking for the opportunity to work at the forefront of radio astronomy and contribute to the operation of one of the world’s most ambitious scientific facilities, this is an exciting opportunity to make a lasting impact – and we would love to hear from you!
Your high-level duties will include:
- Providing authoritative technical leadership for the operational performance, reliability, availability, maintainability and continuous improvement of the SKA-Low telescope and its supporting systems, ensuring the Observatory consistently delivers world-class scientific outcomes.
- Serving as the senior engineering authority for telescope operations, maintaining a comprehensive systems-level understanding of the end-to-end telescope signal chain and supporting infrastructure, and applying expert judgement to resolve highly complex, novel and multidisciplinary challenges.
- Acting as the highest operational engineering escalation point for major incidents, performance degradations and systemic issues, leading technical response activities, directing investigations across engineering disciplines, and driving timely resolution to minimise operational impact.
- Providing strategic oversight of observatory performance, identifying opportunities to optimise reliability, availability, maintainability and operational efficiency, and translating these into sustainable engineering and operational improvements.
- Leading engineering assurance and operational risk management activities, ensuring technical risks are appropriately identified, assessed, mitigated and communicated to support informed operational and organisational decision-making.
- Influencing the technical direction and operational readiness of telescope systems, providing expert input to system design, integration, commissioning, upgrades and lifecycle management activities to ensure operational requirements and long-term maintainability are achieved.
- Leading, mentoring and developing a high-performing Telescope Operations Engineering team, fostering technical excellence, accountability, collaboration and continuous learning across multidisciplinary and geographically dispersed teams.
- Building and maintaining effective relationships with internal and external stakeholders, including Observatory Operations, Engineering, Science Operations, projects, contractors and industry partners, to align priorities and achieve operational objectives.
Role particulars
Location and office arrangements: Geraldton, Western Australia (preferred); or Perth, WA can be considered
Salary: AU$163K – AU$180K per annum (pro-rata for part-time) plus up to 15.4% superannuation
Tenure & work schedule: Indefinite; Full-Time, Part-Time or Job-Share
Reference: 103313
As the successful candidate, you will bring:
- Qualifications and Technical Leadership – A degree in Electrical, Electronic, Telecommunications, RF, Systems Engineering or a related discipline, and/or equivalent demonstrated experience. Post-graduate qualifications are desirable but not essential. Recognised as a senior engineering authority with a demonstrated ability to provide systems-level leadership, strategic technical direction and authoritative advice within complex multidisciplinary engineering and operational environments.
- People and Operational Leadership – Demonstrated success leading multidisciplinary technical teams and engineering operations within complex technical, scientific, industrial or infrastructure environments, including accountability for operational performance, service delivery, asset sustainment, risk management and continuous improvement.
- Engineering Judgement and Problem Solving – Demonstrated ability to resolve highly complex and strategically significant engineering and operational challenges, applying sound engineering judgement, systems thinking and technical leadership to balance operational priorities, risk, performance and organisational objectives.
- Engineering Governance, Safety and Risk Management – Demonstrated expertise in applying systems engineering, reliability engineering, safety assurance, risk management principles and relevant engineering standards to complex engineering systems, delivering improved operational performance, resilience and assurance outcomes.
- Strategic Influence and Stakeholder Engagement – Demonstrated ability to influence engineering governance, technical strategy and organisational decision-making, communicate complex technical concepts to diverse audiences, and build effective relationships across engineering, operations, science, project and executive stakeholders.
- Professional Accreditation – Chartered Professional Engineer (CPEng) status, or eligibility and commitment to obtain Chartered status within an agreed timeframe.
For full details about this role, please review the Position Description.
Not sure if you meet all the criteria?
While it is CSIRO policy that the successful candidate must meet all the essential criteria, there are many ways to demonstrate this. Don’t let the list discourage you. If you are unsure about applying, please reach out to the contact person in the Position Description.
Setting you up for success
We are committed to providing a recruitment process that is fair, equitable and accessible to everyone. We recognise that it may be helpful for us to adjust our process to make it equitable for your individual situation. Please contact the Talent Acquisition Partner via email (see details in the Position Description), or Careers Online team, and let us know how we can support you.
Eligibility
Applications for this position are open to all applicants – Australian/New Zealand Citizens, Australian Permanent Residents, or candidates that either hold, or would be able to obtain, a valid working visa for a specified term (visa sponsorship may be offered).
Appointment to this role is subject to provision of a national police check and may be subject to other security/medical/character requirements.
Life at CSIRO and flexible work arrangements
We work flexibly at CSIRO, offering a range of options for how, when and where you work. We can discuss flexible work arrangements with you during the recruitment process. CSIRO also offers a range of leave entitlements, benefits and career development opportunities. To find out more, visit Careers at CSIRO.
Inclusion and belonging
Solving Australia's greatest challenges takes a diversity of minds and lived experiences. We know diverse teams are more effective and deliver more innovative outcomes. As an equal employment opportunity organisation, we are committed to creating diverse and inclusive teams where people feel they belong. We recognise true diversity encompasses all ages, abilities, cultures, faiths, levels of education, genders, sexualities, diversity of thought and much more. We focus on hiring people who share our values of People First, Further Together, Making it Real and Trusted.
CSIRO holds Platinum Status for the Australian Workplace Equality Index for LGBTQIA+ inclusion, and a Science in Australia Gender Equity Bronze Award.
Child safety
CSIRO is committed to the safety and wellbeing of all children and young people involved in our activities and programs. View our Child Safe Policy.
How to apply
Please apply online, and provide a CV and a detailed cover letter, responding to each of the selection criteria in detail, that best demonstrate your motivation and ability to meet the requirements of this role. Please attach your selection criteria responses to your cover letter as one document.
Applications close
20 September 2026, 11:00pm AEST
