Systems Engineering is a bit discipline and industry specific; a nuclear systems engineer is a bit different from a candy factory systems engineer. But the basi

Systems Engineering is a bit discipline and industry specific; a nuclear systems engineer is a bit different from a candy factory systems engineer. But the basics are about the same. You don't need to understand the product management or biz management side, but it helps. A Senior needs to understand the basic phases of an engineering product's lifecycle from birth to death, and how to design for and complete each one. But a more standard systems engineer just needs to understand how systems work, how they are designed, implemented, and kept running. The rest comes over time. You don't have to be an expert in every part of the product. Like, you don't have to be an Operations Manager to engineer a product for production. The "boring" engineering work is all that's required. But it really helps to know a bit about everything else: how to find requirements, draft designs, liaise with stakeholders, make a POC, test it, implement components, tie them together into a system, test it, run it. Having a sunset plan is also great but not required. It definitely helps to have some experience in the industry you want to work in. If you wanna build a candy factory, having interned on the factory floor helps. Having built similar machines before helps.