Technical Program Manager, Engineering & Delivery in Irvine, California at Field AI

Field AI is transforming how robots interact with the real world. We are building risk-aware, reliable, and field-ready AI systems that address the most complex challenges in robotics, unlocking the full potential of embodied intelligence. We go beyond typical data-driven approaches or pure transformer-based architectures, and are charting a new course, with already-globally-deployed solutions delivering real-world results and rapidly improving models through real-field applications.

We're looking for an Engineering Lead, Effectiveness & Delivery to design and implement the engineering systems, tooling, and workflows that make our organization faster, more reliable, and more connected — from how we identify and resolve bugs, to how we plan and deliver software, to how work flows across product, engineering, QA, and field teams. This is a high-leverage role where you will architect solutions that directly improve how every engineer at FieldAI ships software.

This is a hands-on engineering role, not a coordination role. You will diagnose systemic problems, design solutions, build and ship them, and measure the results. You'll need deep engineering judgment, a strong sense for developer experience, and the ability to earn trust across teams through the quality of your work.

• Architect and implement engineering workflow improvements that measurably reduce bug cycle time — from issue identification through triage, assignment, and resolution

• Redesign and consolidate our Jira project architecture into a unified workspace that eliminates fragmentation, improves cross-team visibility, and reduces overhead for engineers

• Design and build triage and routing systems, automation, and integrations that remove manual friction from how issues move through the organization

• Establish engineering-led delivery practices — work decomposition standards, estimation frameworks, and definition-of-done criteria — that make project execution more predictable without adding unnecessary process

• Design lightweight systems that give engineering leadership accurate, real-time visibility into progress, risk, and capacity

• Identify and remove structural bottlenecks in how work flows from planning through delivery, diagnosing root causes rather than treating symptoms

• Build and implement end-to-end toolchain integrations that create traceability from product intent through engineering work, QA validation, and field outcomes

• Define engineering-owned interfaces and contracts between functions — establishing clear, enforceable definitions of what "ready for engineering," "ready for QA," and "ready for field" actually mean

• Evaluate, select, and integrate tooling that gives each function appropriate visibility without requiring manual synchronization or status reporting

• Strong software engineering background with experience in senior engineering or technical leadership roles
• Track record of improving engineering velocity, delivery predictability, or operational maturity in a meaningful, measurable way
• Deep familiarity with modern engineering toolchains — CI/CD, issue tracking, project management systems, observability, and developer productivity tooling
• Systems thinking: you see organizational friction as a design problem and approach it with the same rigor you'd apply to a distributed systems architecture
• Experience consolidating, redesigning, or scaling engineering infrastructure and workflows across multiple teams
• Strong ability to influence and drive adoption across teams without relying on positional authority
• Excellent judgment about when to introduce process and when to remove it — you optimize for engineering output, not process compliance

• Experience building or leading developer experience, engineering productivity, or engineering operations functions
• Hands-on experience redesigning Jira, Linear, or similar project management architectures at scale
• Background in building integrations and toolchain automation across product, engineering, QA, and field/deployment teams
• Experience in robotics, hardware-adjacent, or field-deployed software environments where the feedback loop between engineering and the field is critical
• Familiarity with engineering metrics and measurement (cycle time, lead time, deployment frequency, MTTR) and how to use them to drive improvement without creating perverse incentives

Our salary range is generous and we take into consideration an individual's background and experience in determining final salary; base pay offered may vary considerably depending on geographic location, job-related knowledge, skills, and experience.

We are solving one of the world's most complex challenges: deploying robots in unstructured, previously unknown environments. Our Field Foundational Models™ set a new standard in perception, planning, localization, and manipulation, ensuring our approach is explainable and safe for deployment.

You will have the opportunity to work with a world-class team that thrives on creativity, resilience, and bold thinking. With a decade-long track record of deploying solutions in the field, winning DARPA challenge segments, and bringing expertise from organizations like DeepMind, NASA JPL, Boston Dynamics, NVIDIA, Amazon, Tesla Autopilot, Cruise Self-Driving, Zoox, Toyota Research Institute, and SpaceX, we are set to achieve our ambitious goals.

To tackle such ambitious challenges, we need a team as unique as our vision — innovators who go beyond conventional methods and are eager to tackle tough, uncharted questions. We're seeking individuals who challenge the status quo, dive into uncharted territory, and bring interdisciplinary expertise. Our team requires not only top AI talent but also exceptional software developers, engineers, product designers, field deployment experts, and communicators.

We are headquartered in always-sunny Irvine, Southern California and have US based and global teammates. Join us, shape the future, and be part of a fun, close-knit team on an exciting journey!

We celebrate diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all employees. Candidates and employees are always evaluated based on merit, qualifications, and performance. We will never discriminate on the basis of race, color, gender, national origin, ethnicity, veteran status, disability status, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status, mental or physical disability, or any other legally protected status.