Staff Engineer, Signal Test Leader

General Overview

Job Title:  Staff Engineer, Hardware Design

Functional Area:  Engineering (ENG)

Career Stream:  Design Engineering Hardware (DHW)

Role:  Staff Engineer (SEN)

Job Code:  SEN-ENG-DHW

Job Band: 10

Direct/Indirect Indicator:  Indirect

Summary

As a Project Signal Test Leader, you will play a pivotal dual role in our new domain-based specialization model. You will act as a Project Coordinator, planning and managing overall validation schedules, and as a Domain Champion (SME), providing deep technical leadership in key testing pillars (e.g., High-Speed, Low-Speed, Clock, Power Integrity). This strategic role is critical for driving project execution, managing relationships with R&D and customers, and ensuring engineering rigor across our server, storage, and communication platforms.

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Detailed Description

Performs tasks such as, but not limited to, the following:

• Validation Planning & Ownership: Develop and approve comprehensive Signal Integrity (SI) and Power Integrity (PI) test plans, defining scope, schedule estimations, and resource allocations.


• Unified Master Test Plan (MTP): Aggregate technically approved test plan drafts from various engineering pillars into a single, unified Master Test Plan for each project.


• Project & Lab Management: Drive project milestones, manage lab bench scheduling, and dynamically adjust testing timelines based on problem occurrence and troubleshooting.


• R&D & Stakeholder Interface: Act as the primary technical interface for customers, Technical Project Leads (TPLs), and Hardware EE/R&D teams. Lead collaborative debugging, failure analysis (FA), and problem-solving sessions.


• Quality Assurance & Review: Perform the final "Project-Level Review" to ensure the complete data package meets rigorous quality standards, and technically approve the data before release.


• Technical Governance: As a Domain Champion, establish and maintain "Master Technical Templates" and Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) to shorten testing times and broaden test coverage.


• Expert-Level Support & Mentorship: Serve as the Subject Matter Expert (SME) to resolve complex technical roadblocks, bugs, or equipment failures. Mentor and train junior engineers on advanced equipment usage and automation (Python/SCPI).

Knowledge/Skills/Competencies

• Experience: Minimum 8–10 years in hardware board-level testing, with a clear progression of technical and leadership responsibilities.


• Architectural Expertise (Preferred): In-depth understanding of PC, server, storage, and communication product architectures from an electrical, SI, and PI perspective.


• Technical Domain Depth: Practical mastery of signal integrity theory and validation of key buses:
  
  
  
  • High-Speed: PCIe (Gen 5/6/7), CXL, DDR5, SAS/SATA, LAN, and ultra-high-speed interfaces (up to 224G).
  
  
  • Power Integrity (PI): Power noise, DC-DC testing, and rail characterization.
  
  
  • Low-Speed/Sideband: I2C, SPI, USB, and SMBus.
  
  
  • Clock: Noise Jitter measurement 
  
  
  
  


• Instrumentation Mastery: Expert hands-on capability with high-end lab equipment (e.g., high-bandwidth oscilloscopes, Vector Network Analyzers [VNA], BERTs, TDR, and active probes).


• Leadership: Strong teamwork spirit with proven experience in managing workloads, scheduling, and customer communication.

Physical Demands

• Duties of this position are performed in a normal office environment.


• Duties may require extended periods of sitting and sustained visual concentration on a computer monitor or on numbers and other detailed data. 


• Repetitive manual movements (e.g., data entry, using a computer mouse, using a calculator, etc.) are frequently required.


• Occasional travel may be required.

Typical Experience

Minimum 8–10 years in hardware board-level testing, with a clear progression of technical and leadership responsibilities.

Typical Education

Degree in Electrical Engineering or equivalent.

Notes

This job description is not intended to be an exhaustive list of all duties and responsibilities of the position. Employees are held accountable for all duties of the job. Job duties and the % of time identified for any function are subject to change at any time.