Senior Systems Engineer: Spine Implant & Instrument Systems
Careers that change lives start here. Medtronic is a global leader in healthcare technology with a Mission to alleviate pain, restore health, and extend life. Our 95,000 employees work across more than 150 countries to put patients first — developing innovative medical technologies that improve the lives of 72+ million patients each year. Your unique talents will help shape the future of healthcare while building a career grounded in purpose, growth, and impact.
A Day in the Life
Medtronic’s Cranial and Spinal Technologies (CST) Operating Unit is committed to transforming patient care through groundbreaking innovations in neurosurgery and spinal procedures. Our comprehensive portfolio includes spinal implants, robotics-assisted surgical solutions like the Stealth AXiS™ Surgical System, StealthStation™ surgical navigation, and biologics for bone healing, all designed to enhance surgical precision, efficiency, and patient outcomes. Beyond technology, we support surgeons through education, training, and clinical research, ensuring they have the tools and knowledge to achieve the best possible results. By continuously driving innovation and collaboration, Medtronic is redefining cranial and spinal care, improving lives worldwide.
Impact patient outcomes. Come for a job, stay for a career.
As a Sr. Systems Engineer, you will develop life-improving medical device products for spine surgery. Key responsibilities include collaborating with a team to design and develop new systems, implants, and instruments; conducting product and use testing; and managing system interfaces between implant and instrument hardware with enabling technologies including but not limited to navigation, robotics, and pre-operative planning. You will actively seek out Voice of the Customer (VOC) input and translate that into system, product, workflow, and interface requirements and specifications; conceptualize system and workflow solutions; and manage interfaces through system integration. You will work under general and workflow direction, may serve as key functional core team member or as an engineer on an extended team, and support multiple programs at a time. The product focus will be on spinal systems to treat degenerative, deformity, and tumor/trauma conditions.
A career at Medtronic is like no other. We’re purposeful. We’re committed. And we’re driven by our Mission to alleviate pain, restore health and extend life for millions of people worldwide. We seek out and hire a diverse workforce at every level: We need fresh ideas and inclusive insights to continue to be an innovative industry leader — that’s why we make it a point to seek out, attract and develop employees who are patient-centric, passionate, and who represent the same wide variety of life experiences as our patients.
Responsibilities may include the following and other duties may be assigned.
Responsibilities may include the following and other duties may be assigned.
- Defines spinal systems and features, inclusive of software and hardware components, that meet the expectations and uses of the customer, regulatory agencies, and the business for enabled spine procedures.
- Collects and analyzes voice of the customer and voice of the business to identify opportunities for system development and generate prioritized customer needs.
- Translates customer needs into specific, well-written, high-quality stakeholder and system requirements.
- Leads and supports in person procedural and project labs in mock OR settings.
- Provides technical leadership in the definition, evaluation, and risk analysis of system designs in collaboration with other functional groups inclusive of R&D and marketing. This includes understanding system interfaces, surgical workflows, and architecture; defining use cases and conditions; investigating and resolving system and hardware (i.e. implant and instrument) issues; making improvements and proposing new functionality to address customer feedback and requests; and leading system-level testing activities in lab-based cadaveric environments or other formative evaluation settings.
- Documents tradeoffs, rationales, and potential solutions.
- Verifies that system requirements have been properly implemented (writing, leveling, tracing) through inspection, demonstration, test or analysis.
- Leads team in identifying and mitigating technical risks, product hazards, and failure modes related to meeting requirements for enabling systems.
- Defines and performs system validation activities ensuring the system meets user needs and intended use.
- Tests and troubleshoots functionality using hardware and capital systems.
- Performs usability studies on workflows and software interfaces with users in a mock OR setting.
- Collaborates across R&D roles responsible for development of different system elements and cross-functional partners including marketing, quality, regulatory, and project management.
- Contributes to and builds domain knowledge around spinal procedures and systems, their clinical use and application, and integration of enabling technologies into spine surgery via customer and field visits, literature searches and training.
- Supports surgeries in a hospital setting.
- Ensures personal understanding of all quality policy/system items that are applicable. Follows all work/quality procedures to ensure quality system compliance and high-quality work.
- Establishes and advocates for best practices and continuous improvement as to mature knowledge and processes
Ability to travel up to: 10-15%
Must Have (Minimum Requirements)
To be considered for this role, please ensure the minimum requirements are evident on your resume.
- Bachelor’s degree required with a minimum of 4 years of relevant experience
- OR advance degree with a minimum of 2 years of relevant experience
Nice to Have (Preferred Qualifications)
- 4+ years spine, orthopaedic, or enabling technology (i.e. Navigation or Robotics) experience.
- Engineering MS degree preferred.
- Experience in Systems Engineering discipline or use of system engineering methodologies in medical devices
- Experience in product concept development, requirements management, surgical workflow development, functional analysis, use case and condition identification, interface definition and control, verification and validation on a cross functional team on complex programs.
- Experience in voice of customer collection, requirements development, analysis, allocation, review, tracing, and verification/validation.
- Experience planning and conducting user evaluations of product concepts, analyzing data, documenting evaluation methods & results, and presenting design recommendations to product teams.
- Demonstrated systems engineering, analytical, & problem solving skills
- Ability to understand spinal procedures and systems of systems.
- Experience with mechanical design, drawings, tolerance analysis, and computer-aided design.
- Familiarity with software design, algorithm design, and iterative software development practices.
- Experience working in cross-functional and collaborative team environments.
- Experience working in a FDA regulated and/or medical device environment and with ISO and Quality System Regulation requirements.
- Excellent written and verbal communication skills.
- Ability of working in a deadline driven environment managing multiple priorities.
TECHNICAL SPECIALIST CAREER STREAM: An individual contributor with responsibility in our technical functions to advance existing technology or introduce new technology and therapies. Formulates, delivers and/or manages projects assigned and works with other stakeholders to achieve desired results. May act as a mentor to colleagues or may direct the work of other lower level professionals. The majority of time is spent delivering R&D, systems or initiatives related to new technologies or therapies – from design to implementation - while adhering to policies, using specialized knowledge and skills.
DIFFERENTIATING FACTORS
Autonomy: Seasoned individual contributor.
Works independently under limited supervision to determine and develop approach to solutions.
Coaches and reviews the work of lower level specialists; may manage projects / processes.
Organizational Impact: May be responsible for entire projects or processes within job area.
Contributes to the completion of work group objectives, through building relationships and consensus to reach agreements on assignments.
Innovation and Complexity: Problems and issues faced are difficult, and may require understanding of multiple issues, job areas or specialties.
Makes improvements of processes, systems or products to enhance performance of the job area.
Analysis provided is in-depth in nature and often provides recommendations on process improvements.
Communication and Influence: Communicates with senior internal and external customers and vendors.
Exchange information of facts, statuses, ideas and issues to achieve objective, and influence decision-making.
Leadership and Talent Management: May provide guidance, coaching and training to other employees within job area.
May manage projects, requiring delegation of work and review of others' work product.
Required Knowledge and Experience: Requires a Baccalaureate degree and minimum of 4 years of relevant experience OR Master's degree with a minimum of 2 years relevant experience OR PhD with 0 years relevant experience.
For Baccalaureate degrees earned outside of the United States, a degree that satisfies the requirements of 8 C.F.R. § 214.2(h)(4)(iii)(A) is required.
Physical Job Requirements
The above statements are intended to describe the general nature and level of work being performed by employees assigned to this position, but they are not an exhaustive list of all the required responsibilities and skills of this position.
The physical demands described within the Responsibilities section of this job description are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions. For Office Roles: While performing the duties of this job, the employee is regularly required to be independently mobile. The employee is also required to interact with a computer, and communicate with peers and co-workers. Contact your manager or local HR to understand the Work Conditions and Physical requirements that may be specific to each role.
U.S. Work Authorization & Sponsorship
At Medtronic, we are committed to fostering an environment where employees can thrive and make a meaningful impact. In alignment with our enterprise-wide workforce planning approach, U.S. work authorization sponsorship (H-1B, TN, J, etc.) is offered exclusively for Principal-level roles and above, where specialized expertise aligns with long-term business needs. Roles below the Principal level require candidates to possess unrestricted U.S. work authorization at the time of hire and for the duration of employment.
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Apply only through official Medtronic channels. All legitimate Medtronic recruiting communications come from approved Medtronic platforms and official @medtronic.com email addresses.
Medtronic will never ask for payment or sensitive personal information (such as bank account or Social Security details) during early stages of the hiring process. Any such requests are not legitimate.
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If you have any questions, concerns regarding the authenticity of a communication alleged to have been made by or on behalf of Medtronic, please contact us immediately at AskHR@medtronic.com.
Benefits & Compensation
Medtronic offers a competitive Salary and flexible Benefits Package
A commitment to our employees lives at the core of our values. We recognize their contributions. They share in the success they help to create. We offer a wide range of benefits, resources, and competitive compensation plans designed to support you at every career and life stage.
This position is eligible for a short-term incentive called the Medtronic Incentive Plan (MIP).The base salary range is applicable across the United States, excluding Puerto Rico and specific locations in California. The offered rate complies with federal and local regulations and may vary based on factors such as experience, certification/education, market conditions, and location. Compensation and benefits information pertains solely to candidates hired within the United States (local market compensation and benefits will apply for others).
The following benefits and additional compensation are available to those regular employees who work 20+ hours per week: Health, Dental and vision insurance, Health Savings Account, Healthcare Flexible Spending Account, Life insurance, Long-term disability leave, Dependent daycare spending account, Tuition assistance/reimbursement, and Simple Steps (global well-being program).
The following benefits and additional compensation are available to all regular employees: Incentive plans, 401(k) plan plus employer contribution and match, Short-term disability, Paid time off, Paid holidays, Employee Stock Purchase Plan, Employee Assistance Program, Non-qualified Retirement Plan Supplement (subject to IRS earning minimums), and Capital Accumulation Plan (available to Vice Presidents and above, or subject to IRS earning minimums).
Regular employees are those who are not temporary, such as interns. Temporary employees are eligible for paid sick time, as required under applicable state law, and the Employee Stock Purchase Plan. Please note some of the above benefits may not apply to workers in Puerto Rico.
Further details are available at the link below:
Medtronic benefits and compensation plans
It is the policy of Medtronic to provide equal employment opportunity (EEO) to all persons regardless of age, color, national origin, citizenship status, physical or mental disability, race, religion, creed, gender, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity and/or expression, genetic information, marital status, status with regard to public assistance, veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local law. In addition, Medtronic will provide reasonable accommodations for qualified individuals with disabilities.
If you are applying to perform work for Medtronic, Inc. (“Medtronic”) in any position which will involve performing at least two (2) hours of work on average each week within the unincorporated areas of Los Angeles County, you can find here a list of all material job duties of the specific job position which Medtronic reasonably believes that criminal history may have a direct, adverse and negative relationship potentially resulting in the withdrawal of a conditional offer of employment. Medtronic will consider for employment qualified job applicants with arrest or conviction records in accordance with the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance for Employers and the California Fair Chance Act.