Associate director physical

Job Description:

Our Opportunity: 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 the scale where production proof matters, and our fulfillment environment creates a demanding, measurable testbed for manipulation, recovery from edge cases, and safe operation around people and equipment.
As Associate Director of Physical AI, you will lead a team of scientists and engineers building the core technical capabilities that make humanoids useful in the real world. You will set the team’s technical agenda, establish a roadmap that balances research ambition with operational outcomes, and partner across engineering, product, operations, and external stakeholders 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.

What You’ll Do

• Own the technical agenda and roadmap for Physical AI, then convert it into priorities, milestones, 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 stakeholders 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 stakeholders when needed to negotiate priorities and deliver outcomes.
• Support talent development efforts such as internships, mentoring early-career hires, and occasional campus recruiting partnership.

What You’ll Need

• 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 cross-functional execution, including planning, resourcing, and stakeholder 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.

Why Join Chewy Robotics
You will lead a team working on Physical AI where deployment is the goal and impact is measurable. Chewy’s scale turns technical progress into operational advantage, and this role will shape how our humanoid robotics capabilities evolve from foundational development to repeatable outcomes in the real world.

The base salary range for this role is $186,500 - $297,500.

• The specific salary offered to a candidate may be influenced by a variety of factors including but not limited to the candidate’s relevant experience, education, and work location. In addition, this position is eligible for 401k and a new hire and annual equity grant. C08+ positions may also be eligible for annual bonus.

We offer different types of insurance and benefits, such as medical/Rx, vision, dental, life, disability, hospital indemnity, critical illness, and accident. We offer parental leave, family services benefits, backup dependent care, flexible spending accounts, telemedicine, pet adoption reimbursement, employee assistance program, and many discounts including 10% off pet insurance and 20% off at Chewy.com.

Exempt salary team members have unlimited PTO, subject to manager approval. Team members will receive six paid holidays per year. Team members may be eligible for paid sick and family leave in compliance with applicable state and local regulations.

Chewy is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, ancestry, national origin, gender, citizenship, marital status, religion, age, disability, gender identity, results of genetic testing, veteran status, as well as any other legally-protected characteristic. If you have a disability under the Americans with Disabilities Act or similar law, and you need an accommodation during the application process or to perform these job requirements, or if you need a religious accommodation, please contact [email protected].