VP of Engineering

About Viam

Viam is building the platform that makes robotics as programmable as software. Our software allows developers and companies to configure, control, and manage physical devices—from a single robot in a lab to fleets of machines deployed in the real world.

The company was founded by Eliot Horowitz, co-founder and former CTO of MongoDB, with the goal of making it dramatically easier to build and operate systems that interact with the physical world.

Today Viam powers developers and organizations working across robotics, industrial automation, research, and connected devices. We’re a ~100-person company headquartered in New York City.

The Engineering Challenge

Building software for the physical world introduces challenges that traditional software systems rarely face. At Viam, engineers build the platform and tools that make hardware easily programmable, observable, and manageable at scale.

About the Role

Location: New York City (Hybrid, 3+ days per week in office)

Our engineering organization is around 60 engineers across teams spanning data infrastructure, fleet management, machine learning, computer vision, networking, sensing, motion planning, visualization, and mobile. We have one VP of Engineering today who joined in early 2022. We're now adding a second to improve delivery and execution across teams.

You'll report directly to the CEO/Founder, Eliot Horowitz and work alongside the other other VP. The team and org ownership for this role will be determined based on who we bring on. We're deliberately shaping the structure around the right leader.

What You'll Own

• Set clear expectations, establish the processes and rituals that make delivery predictable, and hold the organization accountable to shipping.

• Translate business priorities into engineering roadmaps. Own the sequencing decisions and remove blockers before they become delays.

• Develop your directors and managers. Have hard conversations early and build an org where growth and accountability are the same thing.

• Partner with engineering leads to drive standards in code quality, system design, and review culture.

• Establish how decisions get made and how your teams stay connected to what the company is building and why.

What You Bring

• Track record of managing directors and managers across multiple teams and improving how engineering organizations deliver, not just growing them.

• Background building scalable systems at an early-stage startup or in a customer-driven environment. You understand the tradeoffs, can engage at the technical level, and push back when something is off.

• Pattern of walking into ambiguous challenges and bringing structure.

• Bias toward directness. You disagree and commit, and do not wait for consensus to move.

• Genuine curiosity about the platform. Experience with robotics or IoT is not required.

Compensation

The anticipated salary for this role is between $250,000 - 380,000/year. Your exact offer will vary based on factors including experience level, skillset, market location, and internal equity relative to peers at the company. We recognize that the person we hire may be less experienced, or more senior, than this job description as posted. In these situations, the updated salary range will be communicated to you as a candidate.

Full-time Benefits

Viam’s base salary range for this role is posted above. In addition to cash compensation, Viam offers a comprehensive Total Rewards package that includes equity grants, health benefits, and more.

• 100% covered medical/dental/vision insurance plans, commuter benefits

• 25 days paid vacation and generous holiday observances

• Free lunch every day that you’re in the office

• One Medical Membership

• Citi Bike memberships

• Monthly wellness stipend to be used for a variety of fitness-related items like gym memberships, fitness classes, fitness equipment, and more

• Paid parental leave

• Reproductive Health Benefits, including Fertility Benefits and Abortion Access Travel Benefits

• Yearly Learning and Development Budget for your own personal learning goals

Values:

• Vision Driven

• Collaborate Openly

• Act Decisively

• Succeed Through Diversity

• Hold Ourselves Accountable

• Lead with Curiosity

To all recruitment agencies:

Viam does not accept unsolicited agency resumes or calls from recruitment agencies or search firms. Please do not forward resumes to our jobs alias or Viam employees. Viam is not responsible for any fees related to unsolicited resumes.