Sr. Autonomy Technical Program Manager at Rivian in US-CA-Palo Alto

Job description

• The Autonomy Sim Infra & Evaluation TPM team plays a key role in driving the most important initiatives within the Autonomy organization at Rivian. If you are looking for a team that just takes notes or is just a scrum master, this is not it. We are here to execute cross-functional projects that a) require tight coordination and dependencies, involving everything from sense and compute HW, Perception & Pose (heavily reliant on ML), Planning & Controls, Infrastructure & Simulation (critical for ML model training/validation), Systems Definition, Integration & Triage, etc., and b) need to be delivered in order to build a great Autonomy product.

Responsibilities

• Lead initiatives around building the simulation infrastructure and tooling used for validating Autonomy, which includes both the classical stack and end-to-end driving model.
• Drive the creation / maintenance of simulation datasets used to gate and monitor regression / progression of driving behaviors. This will involve working across Triage, Systems, Data, Simulation infra, and other Autonomy teams to make sure notable insights from our fleet are converted to sim tests and used for hill-climbing feature performance.
• Exercise strong ownership over programs they lead, including diving into the technical details to drive smooth execution and briefing the VP of Autonomy & AI on progress and risks.
• Drive pragmatic decisions and tradeoffs to maximize probability of hitting critical timelines, considering factors unique to ML projects such as model iteration speed, data annotation pipelines, and compute resource allocation.
• Manage ambiguity by presenting options with a clear point of view for leadership, particularly concerning feature readiness, evaluation metrics, and performance trade-offs.
• Understand the role of TPM as an insider/outsider, someone who drives accountability through influence and soft power rather than hard power and authority.
• Mentor other TPMs on the team and help them grow their craft as TPMs, sharing expertise in managing ML-centric technical programs.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Science, Data Science, Engineering, or equivalent experience, with a strong foundation in areas relevant to AI/ML.
• Experience in Technical Program Management on deep tech products or equivalent, specifically managing programs involving AI/ML components and data pipelines.
• Hands on experience with ML-based products including evaluation with metrics driven analysis.
• Strong interpersonal skills and ability to effectively communicate to external partner organizations to drive shared outcomes for Rivian, especially when collaborating on data sharing, model deployment, or platform integration related to AI/ML.
• Experience with Autonomy systems, Robotaxis, and/or Robotics, particularly involving the integration and management of complex AI/ML models.
• ML development in resource-constrained environments, demonstrating an understanding of the practical challenges of deploying ML on automotive-grade hardware.
• You enjoy prototyping random side projects in your spare time, ideally related to AI/ML or robotics.

Skills

Required

• Technical Program Management
• AI/ML components and data pipelines
• Strong interpersonal skills

Benefits

• We offer a comprehensive package of benefits for full-time and part-time employees, their spouse or domestic partner, and children up to age 26, including but not limited to paid vacation, paid sick leave, and a competitive portfolio of insurance benefits including life, medical, dental, vision, short-term disability insurance, and long-term disability insurance to eligible employees. You may also have the opportunity to participate in Rivian’s 401(k) Plan and Employee Stock Purchase Program if you meet certain eligibility requirements. Full-time employee coverage is effective on their first day of employment. Part-time employee coverage is effective the first of the month following 90 days of employment. More information about benefits is available at rivianbenefits.com.
• The salary range for this role is $132,100-$165,100 for San Francisco Bay Area based applicants. This is the lowest to highest salary we in good faith believe we would pay for this role at the time of this posting. An employee’s position within the salary range will be based on several factors including, but not limited to, specific competencies, relevant education, qualifications, certifications, experience, skills, geographic location, shift, and organizational needs.