Technical Manager, Atlas Controls Reliability

The Mission

Boston Dynamics is scaling the Atlas humanoid fleet to push the limits of generalist robotics. As the Controls Reliability Manager, you will lead an engineering team sitting directly at the high-stakes intersection of Prototype Operations and R&D Engineering.

This is not a traditional "tech support" or maintenance role. Your mandate is to embrace this intersection to enhance collaboration, boost fleet throughput, and build the software toolchains, automated health checks, and data infrastructure that turn physical hardware into a clean, data-driven engine for Controls and AI Research progress.

What You’ll Do

• Lead & Mentor: Build and guide a multi-disciplinary team of engineers bridging the gap between field operations and lab R&D. 

• Drive Progress with Data: Synthesize complex failure trends from the field into high-signal data. Your team's data will directly influence future hardware designs, controls code, and AI model training.

• Automated System Diagnostics: Lead the design and development of onboard and offboard systems that flag anomalies before they interrupt an experiment.

• Standardize & Automate: Relentlessly target recurring, manual troubleshooting tasks and automate them away. For known edge cases, build clear, systematic "Diagnostic Playbooks" to empower field teams to handle issues independently.

• Orchestrate Resources: Manage your team's day-to-day balance, ensuring critical live field escalations get handled without derailing long-term diagnostic software roadmaps. 

Who You Are

• A Grounded Player-Coach: You have real experience managing technical staff in fast-paced R&D or hardware-focused SRE environments. You are still eager to roll up your sleeves, look at a robot log, or map out a "debug tree" alongside your team.

• A Systematic Problem Solver: You instinctively rely on the scientific method—testing hypotheses through deliberate experimentation. You clearly distinguish between immediate issue containment and long-term, permanent mitigation.

• An Automation First-Thinker: You naturally look for scalable architectural solutions instead of quick, manual fixes. You want to build tools that prevent fires, not just put them out. 

• A Unifier: You know how to build bridges across teams. When a multi-disciplinary crisis hits, you pull together the right hardware, software, and operations experts to solve the problem collectively rather than passing the buck.

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Robotics, ME/EE, Computer Science, or a related field.

• 5+ years of professional experience in robotics, hardware reliability, or technical R&D; 2+ years in a leadership role.

• Proven experience debugging complex electromechanical hardware in a lab or field environment.

• Proficiency in C++ and Python for system analysis and tool development.

• Ability to work onsite at our Waltham facility for direct hardware interaction and team mentorship.

We are interested in every qualified candidate who is eligible to work in the United States. However, we are not able to sponsor visas for this position.

The base pay range for this position is between $155,000 to $210,000 annually. Base pay will depend on multiple individualized factors including, but not limited to internal equity, job related knowledge, skills and experience. This range represents a good faith estimate of compensation at the time of posting. Boston Dynamics offers a generous Benefits package including medical, dental vision, 401(k), paid time off and a annual bonus structure. Additional details regarding these benefit plans will be provided if an employee receives an offer for employment. We are growing rapidly, building a commercial company that delivers cutting edge technology and solutions to our customers from industrial applications to logistics and warehouse solutions.