Manager, Applied Science

Adobe • San Jose, CA

1d • $149,300 - $324,450

About The Position

Changing the world through digital experiences is what Adobe’s all about. We give everyone—from emerging artists to global brands—everything they need to design and deliver exceptional digital experiences! We’re passionate about empowering people to create beautiful and powerful images, videos, and apps, and transform how companies interact with customers across every screen. We’re on a mission to hire the very best and are committed to creating exceptional employee experiences where everyone is respected and has access to equal opportunity. We realize that new ideas can come from everywhere in the organization, and we know the next big idea could be yours! Adobe Firefly Applied Science & Machine Learning (ASML) is looking for a Manager, Applied Science – Generative AI Foundations to lead a team building core systems that support training and development of foundation models for generative AI, spanning image, video, and multimodal generation. This role is designed for a technical lead manager who combines strong software engineering and systems experience with applied ML understanding and people leadership. You will lead a team responsible for foundational training frameworks, tooling, and codebases that enable large-scale experimentation, reliable execution, and rapid iteration across multiple generative AI efforts at Adobe. The focus of this role is on foundational capabilities and engineering systems that support many models and teams, rather than ownership of a single model or research area. You will work closely with applied researchers, ML engineers, and product partners to turn evolving research and product needs into scalable, maintainable, and production-ready systems. Success in this role requires strong engineering judgment, comfort with ambiguity, and the ability to guide both system design and applied ML workflows, while scaling impact through effective team leadership and execution.

Requirements

• Master’s or PhD in Computer Science, Engineering, AI/ML, or a related technical field, or equivalent practical experience
• At least 2+ years of experience leading or managing technical teams in large-scale systems engineering or AI/ML domains
• Strong hands-on software engineering experience building and operating large-scale distributed systems, or experience working on model training systems and ML infrastructure
• Experience working with complex codebases, production services, or internal platforms used by multiple teams
• Ability to operate as a technical leader, making sound design tradeoffs and unblocking complex engineering problems
• Strong communication skills and the ability to collaborate across research, engineering, and product organizations
• Comfort working in fast-moving, ambiguous environments typical of generative AI development

Responsibilities

• Lead and grow a team of applied scientists and engineers working on core generative AI training systems
• Own and evolve key parts of the training and experimentation codebase, focusing on reliability, scalability, and developer productivity
• Partner closely with applied research and engineering teams to support the full lifecycle from experimentation to production
• Drive technical design and architecture decisions for large-scale training systems, pipelines, and supporting infrastructure
• Remain hands-on enough to review designs, guide implementation choices, and unblock complex technical issues
• Establish best practices for system robustness, testing, observability, and reproducibility
• Drive execution against milestones while adapting to changing research and product priorities
• Build a strong team culture focused on ownership, collaboration, and continuous improvement

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Manager