How To Become A Chief Systems Engineer: What It Is and Career Path

What is a chief systems engineer and how to become one

Updated January 8, 2025

3 min read

There is more than meets the eye when it comes to being a chief systems engineer. For example, did you know that they make an average of $61.72 an hour? That's $128,373 a year! Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow 3% and produce 9,800 job opportunities across the U.S.

ScoreChief Systems EngineerUS Average

Salary

8.3

Avg. Salary $128,373

Avg. Salary $59,228

Stability level

5.7

Growth rate 3%

Growth rate 0.3%

Diversity

6.1

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 0.18%

Asian 14.37%

Black or African American 4.87%

Hispanic or Latino 11.35%

Unknown 4.71%

White 64.51%

Gender

female 10.58%

male 89.42%

Age - 44

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 3.00%

Asian 7.00%

Black or African American 14.00%

Hispanic or Latino 19.00%

White 57.00%

Gender

female 47.00%

male 53.00%

Age - 44

Stress level

5.7

Stress level is manageable

7.1 - high

Complexity level

8.3

Complexity level is challenging

7 - challenging

Work life balance

7.2

Work life balance is good

6.4 - fair

Key steps to become a chief systems engineer

Explore chief systems engineer education requirements

Most common chief systems engineer degrees

Bachelor's

57.5 %

Master's

19.3 %

Associate

13.6 %

Start to develop specific chief systems engineer skills

Skills	Percentages
Systems Engineering	12.56%
System Architecture	5.11%
DOD	5.02%
Logistics	4.83%
Program Management	4.42%

Complete relevant chief systems engineer training and internships

Accountants spend an average of 1-2 years on post-employment, on-the-job training. New chief systems engineers learn the skills and techniques required for their job and employer during this time. The chart below shows how long it takes to gain competency as a chief systems engineer based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real chief systems engineer resumes.

Research chief systems engineer duties and responsibilities

Manage the technical performance, cost, and schedule of RF and electronic equipment subcontractors.
Accomplish responsibility to configure, administer and support new infrastructure solutions on Microsoft platforms to meet enterprise level requirements.
Implement HPVM UNIX Virtualization and configuration for all dev/test on SAN.
Mentore and serve as a technical resource for less experience Java developers.

Get chief systems engineer experience

Generally, it takes 4-6 years to become a chief systems engineer. The most common roles before becoming a chief systems engineer include systems engineer, program manager team lead and senior systems engineer.

Prepare your chief systems engineer resume

When your background is strong enough, you can start writing your chief systems engineer resume.

You can use Zippia's AI resume builder to make the resume writing process easier while also making sure that you include key information that hiring managers expect to see on a chief systems engineer resume. You'll find resume tips and examples of skills, responsibilities, and summaries, all provided by Zippi, your career sidekick.

Choose from 10+ customizable chief systems engineer resume templates

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