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Dave Kaufman is offering advice on career paths to aspiring engineers as the President of Ìý

Kaufman began his 30-year career in industry as a thermal engineer. He gradually took on new roles and opportunities, managing larger and larger teams until he became president of BAE Systems’ Space & Mission Systems sector, previously known as Ball Aerospace.

A year after Ball Aerospace’s acquisition by BAE Systems, Inc., Kaufman shared insights with students in a special seminar April 10 hosted by Mark Sirangelo in the Ann and H.J. Smead Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences at the University of Colorado Boulder.

If you were studying engineering today, where would you focus?

If you read career guidebooks, they say you’ve got to have a plan. You have to know what your next step is and where you’re going, or you’ll never get there. That’s not true. I never knew where I was going. I was doing a job, and I found it exciting.

Quantum and AI are important, but truly, study what you love. If it’s interesting to you, you’ll keep going. It was that excitement that kept me going. The things we do are hard. If you don’t love it, it’s going to be a grind.

It might not be the subject, but it might be who you’re studying under. All of us have had a couple of teachers who changed our direction. Being open to that is important.

You worked at Hughes, Boeing and then Ball Aerospace in frontline engineering positions for 10 years before making the leap to leadership. What led to that change?

I wanted to solve challenges and achieve missions. I was fortunate because I was selected to lead a little team as the thermal lead. In that role, I coached and helped out, which exposed me to people leadership. That felt like me.

My leadership opportunities started as a lot of chance. I did it because it needed to be done, and I liked it and was invested. I’m always learning something. I moved from engineering jobs and program engineering jobs to proposals and portfolios. As I went on, every step I led more people, focused a little less on the technology and moved a little closer to the customer. The journey was just so exciting.

What was the transition to leadership like?

You have choices along the way. You can be a SME – a subject matter expert – basically a really hardcore engineer or scientist. Or you can lead a function. I took the project path. Those aren’t necessarily mutually exclusive, but at some point, you make a choice. I’m glad that I picked what I did, but I’m so appreciative of people who picked differently.

As I moved away from the work and moved toward management, my value as an employee changed. I didn’t design, but I influenced projects and made contributions through all these people.

The other piece of it was that I had to give up doing the job I used to do, and that was difficult. Letting go is so important. I needed to let the new person do that job, even though there were things they were going to do that I wouldn’t do that way. But there are some parts of that job they will do better than I would ever imagine.

What skills are more important today for students than when you were in college?

Don’t shirk your writing skills. Students coming out of pure engineering schools sometimes don’t have the writing skills. It’s not fun, but the most brilliant analysis in the world is only your own. You’ve got to tell somebody about it. That communication in written form or in presentations is so important. I really see it as the difference between someone staying at the lower level and moving up.

Ball Aerospace has been a part of Boulder for decades. How have things changed since BAE Systems acquired the company?

BAE Systems, Inc. is the U.S. subsidiary of BAE Systems plc, a global aerospace, defense, and security company. The Inc. business is based in Falls Church, Virginia, and operates independently through a Special Security Agreement between the U.S. Government, BAE Systems, Inc. and BAE Systems plc.

When Ball Aerospace was acquired, we became a new sector called Space & Mission Systems. Our team of more than 5,200 colleagues were welcomed to BAE Systems, where together we continue to share our values of mission-driven innovation and operational excellence.