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Leidos is seeking a Senior Exercise Planner to lead aspects of HSEEP exercise design, development, conduct, and evaluation for CISA’s National Cyber Exercise Program (NCEP). This role supports the Regional Exercise Lead for their assigned regional exercises and leads aspects such as planning meetings, scenario development, exercise documentation, facilitation, exercise conduct, and exercise evaluation, for multiple concurrent exercises across their region.
If this sounds like the kind of environment where you can thrive, keep reading!
Leidos’ Homeland Sector’s Airports, Borders, and Security (ABS) business area delivers air travel modernization, border protection, and critical infrastructure security solutions that help build a safer, more resilient homeland. Operating globally across aviation security, passenger screening, cybersecurity, and border and port security, ABS integrates next-generation technologies—including AI-driven analytics, advanced threat detection, and command-and-control platforms—to secure the movement of people and goods worldwide by improving situational awareness, accelerating decisions, and strengthening operational outcomes for customers.
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Senior Exercise Planner
Primary Responsibilities Include:
Work with the Regional Exercise Lead to determine specific exercise aspects to lead.
Lead all activities, documentation, communication, and coordination among the exercise support team for assigned aspect (e.g., scenario, evaluation, exercise documentation, planning meetings, etc.)
Communicate and coordinate regularly across exercise support team, with Regional Exercise Lead, and with exercise stakeholders to ensure planning timelines, resources, and staffing are maintained.
Participate in initial meetings with Regional Exercise Lead and exercise stakeholders to establish familiarity with the exercise support team, with the stakeholder leads, and to confirm exercise schedules.
Lead or support and participate in all planning meetings (as appropriate), such as C&O, IPM, MPM, MSEL Meeting, and FPM, and in developing all supporting documentation, including agendas, presentations, and notes.
Lead or support the development of core exercise documentation and artifacts (e.g., CONOPS, EXPLAN, SITMAN, MSEL, COSIN, evaluation forms, invitations/sign-in sheets).
Support end-to-end exercise execution: concept and scope, execution support, evaluation approach, and post-exercise reporting (AAR and assigned reports).
Report regularly to Regional Exercise Lead and across exercise support team according to communications plan.
Attend and participate in each exercise within assigned region as a designated exercise support role to be determined by Regional Exercise Lead and exercise support team requirements.
Fill in as Exercise Facilitator if necessary.
Support development of new CISA Tabletop Exercise Packages (CTEPs) and maintenance of the CTEP scenario library.
Provide SME input to internal training activities to improve facilitation and planning skills across NCEP staff.
Required Experience, Skills, and Education:
Ability to obtain CISA EOD.
10+ years experience in HSEEP exercise design, development, conduct, and evaluation.
FEMA HSEEP certification required or ability to complete HSEEP certification within 30 days of contract start.
Demonstrated experience planning and delivering exercises or exercise-like events that require structured documentation, coordination, and post-event reporting.
Strong writing skills to develop polished exercise materials and documents (such as EXPLANs, SITMANs, MSELs, and controller/observer instructions) and post-exercise products (including AAR drafting support).
Demonstrated ability to lead high-level meetings, exercise facilitation, and give customer-facing presentations.
Demonstrated ability to manage time, meet deadlines and milestones, and hold team members accountable to requirements.
Ability to meet CISA suitability and the clearance requirement applicable to the assigned role (TS/SCI for designated personnel; otherwise Public Trust fitness type), as described in the SOW.
Preferred Experience, Skills, and Education:
TS/SCI security clearance
FEMA Master Exercise Practitioner (MEP)
Experience supporting cybersecurity-focused scenarios and stakeholder engagement across government and private sector partners.
Experience contributing to strategic plan maintenance and innovation projects in support of leadership requests.
Cybersecurity Certifications
CISSP
CEH
GIAC
Please be advised that during the interview, you will be required to keep your camera on, and your interviewer will be taking your picture for identification purposes if an offer letter is extended to you.
If you're looking for comfort, keep scrolling. At Leidos, we outthink, outbuild, and outpace the status quo — because the mission demands it. We're not hiring followers. We're recruiting the ones who disrupt, provoke, and refuse to fail. Step 10 is ancient history. We're already at step 30 — and moving faster than anyone else dares.
Original Posting:
October 7, 2026For U.S. Positions: While subject to change based on business needs, Leidos reasonably anticipates that this job requisition will remain open for at least 3 days with an anticipated close date of no earlier than 3 days after the original posting date as listed above.
Pay Range:
Pay Range $82,550.00 - $149,225.00The Leidos pay range for this job level is a general guideline only and not a guarantee of compensation or salary. Additional factors considered in extending an offer include (but are not limited to) responsibilities of the job, education, experience, knowledge, skills, and abilities, as well as internal equity, alignment with market data, applicable bargaining agreement (if any), or other law.
Leidos is a defense and intelligence technology company that provides systems engineering, software development, and operational support services to U.S. government agencies, particularly the Department of Defense and federal enterprises. The company specializes in enterprise infrastructure modernization, cloud and virtualization technologies, cybersecurity compliance, and mission-critical application support across domains including human resources systems, security infrastructure, and enterprise operations. Leidos delivers solutions that span middleware platforms, container orchestration, virtual machine management, and complex enterprise system administration in secure, production environments.
