Team Lead - Thermofluids Analysis

ABOUT ROCKET LAB
Rocket Lab is the end-to-end space company building rockets, spacecraft, and critical subsystems that keep the world connected, protected, expand humanity’s reach to the Moon, Mars, and beyond. We move fast, build real hardware for meaningful missions, and make the impossible routine. Come shape the future with us.
While other companies talk about it, we do it!
NEUTRON
Rocket Lab’s Neutron team is responsible for bringing our new large rocket Neutron and its launch and test sites to life. From designing and testing Neutron’s structures and components, to firing up its new Archimedes engines, to setting up Neutron’s launch pads and test sites across the United States, joining the Neutron team is your opportunity to help launch a new large rocket for the very first time.
TEAM LEAD - THERMOFLUIDS ANALYSIS
We're looking for a Team Lead to head up our Thermofluids Analysis team, taking ownership of all thermodynamics and fluid mechanics across our launch systems.
In this role, you'll lead a multidisciplinary team spanning Aeroscience, Thermal, and Propellant analysis, representing these domains to the program’s product-focused teams. You'll inform and direct concept-level trades around architecture, operation, and capability; evaluate systems for their performance, environments, and characteristics; and use those insights to shape requirements and drive risk posture across the program.
Beyond the technical, you'll be responsible for building and developing the team itself—mentoring and supporting your direct reports, identifying skills gaps, meeting resourcing needs, and ensuring the successful delivery of key strategic engineering projects. You'll also set the appropriate level of fidelity needed to make informed engineering decisions, develop and maintain the tools and capabilities that underpin the team's analyses, and engage stakeholders across the organisation to unlock progress.
This role is based in Auckland, New Zealand.
WHAT YOU'LL GET TO DO:
Leadership & Team Development
Manage, mentor, and develop your direct reports—providing coaching, timely feedback, and professional development opportunities while identifying skills gaps to drive cross-functional training
Ensure the successful delivery of key strategic engineering projects, negotiating resource and priority across the organization
Provide regular project status updates, conduct peer reviews, and produce qualification test levels through consistent application of approved margining approaches
Aeroscience
Generate aerotables and characterise vehicle performance—covering stability, control authority, loads, pressure distributions, and aerodynamic design of vehicle control surfaces
Perform, validate, and document CFD analyses of external flow across hypersonic, transonic and subsonic regimes, and characterise aerodynamic and heating environments, transients, and separation events
Model plumes and plume interactions (base heating, PIFS, impingement) and define re-entry architecture, including ballistic coefficients, ConOps, and compartment venting
Thermal
Own system thermal design across ground, flight, and in-space operations, including TPS response, compartment thermals, insulation, and component thermal modelling
Perform heat transfer simulations (conduction, convection, radiation) and characterise thermal environments, developing design guidelines and mitigations
Model HVAC and cavity conditioning (flow/temperature specification, pressure drop, flammability, cleanliness, humidity) and support payload integration and customer ITAs