Sr. Principal Tradeshows & Events

Job Summary:

Mercury Systems is seeking a seasoned Senior Principal Tradeshows & Events to lead our global events portfolio—combining strategic planning with hands-on execution. This leader will own the end-to-end lifecycle of industry tradeshows, conferences, demos, and partner activations, ensuring each event advances our brand, aligns to corporate priorities, and delivers measurable ROI.

In this role you will help drive the strategic planning and execution of Mercury’s tradeshow and events initiatives to help promote products, capabilities and successes of a growing global organization.

The successful candidate will be responsible for handling administrative and logistics including coordinating and executing  a variety of events from industry tradeshows and conferences to internal/external events. This role will have the opportunity to partner directly with key stakeholders and executives across the entire organization. In this role, you’ll have the opportunity to strategize and creatively contribute to campaigns that carry through corporate industry events and demonstrate value. Partnering with key stakeholders, you will help build an in-depth knowledge of the organization’s priorities, strategy, and theme for each event. Additionally, collaborate among Marketing, Communications and Growth teams to  help streamline our conference processes using fresh ideas and organizational skills, leveraging resources across teams to ensure measurable outcomes, and exceptional execution. Role reports to Senior Director, Marketing and is a key member of the Marketing and Communications team.

Job Responsibilities:

Strategic Planning & Portfolio Management

• Build and maintain a data-driven events portfolio aligned with corporate priorities.
• Define event objectives and KPIs.
• Lead Mercury-wide Steering Committee (Steerco 3.0) governance for planning, commitments, and decisions.
• Partner with Growth teams to streamline ownership and processes.
• Strategic relationships and Industry partnership ownership and development.

Operational Leadership & Execution

• Own event budgets and control processes.
• Manage Mercury corporate industry memberships (i.e., NDIA, AUSA, AFCEA, etc.).
• Drive 12-month planning cycles.
• Orchestrate flagship Tier 1 and Tier 2 events (approximately 20 per year)
• Scale templates and logistics systems including EMEA support.
• Manage vendor ecosystem with clear scopes and SLAs.
• Ensure consistent brand messaging across events.

Measurement & Continuous Improvement

• Establish event scorecards and ROI frameworks.
• Analyze industry trends and integrate into strategy.
• Present recaps and post-event evaluations to Leadership.

Required Qualifications:

• Typically requires a minimum of 10 years of related hands‑on experience or a Bachelor’s degree
• Domestic and international Travel as required. Up to 30%.
• Proven ability managing large budgets , contracts & vendors.
• Hands-on execution leadership across logistics.
• Must have tradeshow and events background possibly in defense industry .
• Cross-functional leadership skills; strong project management discipline.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience with technical demos at major A&D events.
• Portfolio rationalization experience.
• salesforce  experience to run and evaluate pipeline/opportunity reports related to tradeshow strategy.

Physical Demands: (Select if applicable)

• Specific abilities required by the job include positioning oneself to lift or move objects weighing up to 40lbs.

• Constantly move objects and use abdominal and lower back muscles to provide support over time without fatigue. 
• Constant movement and use of limbs.
• Specific abilities required by this job include prolonged standing, walking, bending, kneeling, stooping, crouching, crawling, climbing and frequently pinching and/or gripping.
• Frequently observe, detect, discern, and convey information.
• Specific abilities required by this job include near, far and color vision acuity, peripheral vision, depth perception and ability to adjust focus.
• Requires good manual dexterity/coordination, and stamina.

“This position requires you to access information that is subject to U.S. export regulations.  You may only access such information if you are a U.S. citizen, lawful permanent resident of the U.S., protected individual as defined by 8 U.S.C. 1324b(a)(3), or eligible to obtain the required authorizations from the U.S. government.”