Technical Program Manager

AIM•Seattle, WA

About The Position

AIM builds autonomy for the real world - robots that move mountains. Our systems fuse software, electronics, mechanics, perception, and mission-critical infrastructure into ruggedized, safety-critical machinery operating on jobsites across the world. We replace manual, error-prone, high-risk tasks with intelligent machines that reshape how earthmoving is done. We're growing fast, scaling globally, and building the technology foundation that will define the next century of construction. As a Senior TPM, you will orchestrate the end-to-end lifecycle of AIM’s most critical cross-functional programs. You will define and drive programs, provide technical leadership, ensure execution excellence, foster cross-functional influence, and maintain operational excellence. This role requires a deep understanding of systems engineering, safety engineering, and program execution, with the ability to dive into technical details while also managing business goals and risks. You will partner closely with engineering managers and principal engineers to translate chaos into clarity, ambiguity into strategy, and strategy into execution.

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree in CS, EE, Robotics, Computer Engineering, Mechanical Engineering - or equivalent hands-on technical experience.
7+ years of technical program management, engineering management, robotics deployment, or equivalent cross-functional experience.
Proven success driving complex, cross-disciplinary engineering programs from inception to delivery.
Ability to dive deeply into technical system design and communicate trade-offs, risks, and decisions clearly.
Experience working directly with hardware, firmware, robotics, or mission-critical software.
Demonstrated ability to manage ambiguity, reduce complexity, and deliver predictable outcomes across multiple teams.
Strong judgment and experience managing programs with competing priorities, tight timelines, and high operational risk.
Hands-on experience with engineering process development - sprints, ORRs, incident management, testing, QA, or deployment readiness.
Experience working with suppliers, vendors, or cross-organizational partners.
Willingness to travel to customer sites, OEM partners, and global deployments.

Nice To Haves

Experience with autonomous systems, robotics, industrial controls, heavy machinery, or real-world hardware-software systems.
Prior experience managing programs involving GNSS/INS, LiDAR, perception systems, real-time embedded systems, or machine safety.
Demonstrated success running high-risk field deployments or customer-facing technical operations.
Strong ability to simplify complex systems and drive architectural clarity across teams.
Ability to influence system architecture, engineering processes, and organizational mechanisms at scale.
Experience managing OEM partnerships or government/enterprise programs with high compliance requirements.
Mastery of modern program mechanisms: PR/FAQ, 6-pagers, risk matrices, design reviews, and operational readiness frameworks.

Responsibilities

Define & Drive Programs (Strategic + Tactical): Own the roadmap for complex programs spanning hardware, robotics, autonomy, and cloud infrastructure. Define program mission, vision, tenets, success metrics, and long-term goals. Translate ambiguous problems into clear requirements and orchestrate delivery across multiple engineering teams. Work backwards from customers, field operations, and OEM partners to ensure deployments meet safety, performance, and reliability bars.
Technical Leadership: Dive deep into system architecture - hardware interfaces, perception pipelines, control systems, on-machine compute, system health, and data flows. Ask the right technical questions, identify architectural risks early, and ensure trade-offs are made with full awareness of long-term consequences. Partner with senior engineers to force-multiply engineering capacity and simplify system interactions across teams.
Execution Excellence: Manage the lifecycle of highly complex, multi-team programs - requirements, design, implementation, integration, testing, deployment, and maintenance. Drive critical path decisions, mitigate risks proactively, clear blockers, coordinate dependencies, and escalate with perfect judgment. Build and evolve mechanisms for predictable program delivery across teams - ORRs, CoEs, design reviews, cross-team schedules, and risk frameworks.
Cross-functional Influence: Collaborate with engineering, field ops, deployment teams, OEM partners, vendors, and customers across global time zones. Communicate at all levels - from deeply technical engineering discussions to executive-level program narratives. Harmonize conflicting viewpoints and drive alignment across hardware, software, autonomy, and operations.
Operational Excellence: Ensure programs uphold the highest bars for safety, availability, testability, serviceability, and customer readiness. Identify systemic gaps and drive mechanisms that eliminate repeat issues. Continuously raise engineering quality and process rigor across teams.