Associate Director, Physical AI

Chewy•Woburn, MA

2d•Onsite

About The Position

Humanoid robotics is moving from impressive demos to real production deployments, and the teams that translate frontier AI into repeatable, safe, high-throughput operation will define the category. Chewy operates at a scale where production proof is essential. Our fulfillment environment provides a fast paced, measurable testbed for manipulation, recovery from edge cases, and safe operation around people and equipment. As Associate Director of Physical AI, you will coordinate a group of scientists and engineers. They build core technical capabilities that make humanoids useful in the real world. You will set the team’s technical agenda and establish a roadmap balancing research ambition with operational outcomes. You will also partner across engineering, product, operations, and external collaborators to deliver a portfolio of results that compounds over time. This is a hands-on leadership role for someone who can navigate trade-offs, raise technical standards, and develop talent while driving execution.

Requirements

BS or MS in Robotics, Computer Science, Electrical/Mechanical Engineering, or a related field.
5+ years people leadership experience, including hiring, coaching, and developing engineers and scientists across career stages.
10+ years building complex technical systems in robotics, autonomy, or Physical AI, with evidence of delivering through ambiguity.
Demonstrated ownership of technical roadmaps and multi-functional execution, including planning, resourcing, and collaborator alignment.
Strong foundation across relevant domains such as robotics systems, learning-based methods, controls, simulation, and evaluation.
Software leadership experience in robotics or hardware contexts, including leading teams that ship embedded controls software, robotics software stacks, or safety- and reliability-relevant systems.
Proven ability to lead a team to take technology from ideation to first-article delivery, with clear artifacts such as prototypes, integration milestones, validation results, or pilot readiness gates.
Strong written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to frame trade-offs and drive decision-ready alignment.
Ability to travel occasionally.

Responsibilities

Own the technical agenda and roadmap for Physical AI, then convert it into priorities, achievements, and measurable success criteria.
Lead a mid-size team (5–10) of scientists and engineers, including hiring, coaching, performance management, and career development.
Drive end-to-end delivery from ideation through first-article capability, including requirements, architecture, validation strategy, and operational readiness.
Make high-judgment trade-offs across scope, quality, timeline, safety, and technical risk, while keeping collaborators aligned and decisions crisp.
Set engineering standards that make work reproducible and deployable, with strong practices for design reviews, testing, evaluation, and iterative improvement.
Partner across Chewy (robotics, safety, operations, product, and engineering leadership) and with external collaborators when needed to negotiate priorities and deliver outcomes.
Support talent development efforts such as internships, mentoring early-career hires, and occasional campus recruiting partnership.

Benefits

401k
new hire and annual equity grant
annual bonus
medical/Rx insurance
vision insurance
dental insurance
life insurance
disability insurance
hospital indemnity insurance
critical illness insurance
accident insurance
parental leave
family services benefits
backup dependent care
flexible spending accounts
telemedicine
pet adoption reimbursement
employee assistance program
discounts including 10% off pet insurance and 20% off at Chewy.com
unlimited PTO, subject to manager approval
six paid holidays per year
paid sick and family leave in compliance with applicable state and local regulations