Deployment & Engagement Operations Lead

Physical Intelligence is bringing general-purpose AI into the physical world. We are a group of engineers, scientists, roboticists, and company builders developing foundation models and learning algorithms to power the robots of today and the physically-actuated devices of the future.

This role sits in Research Operations and works closely with partnerships, research, hardware, and infrastructure. Partnerships sets the terms of each engagement and research owns the technical goal. This role owns everything it takes to deliver operationally, from the point an agreement takes shape through completion.

This role requires sound judgment, comfort with ambiguity, and a strong sense of ownership. You will start as a hands-on individual contributor, build the playbook for how PI runs external engagements, and grow the team that supports future partners and deployments.

As our work scales, more of it happens alongside external partners and at deployment sites. Each engagement brings its own site, schedule, stakeholders, and constraints. The Deployment & Engagement Operations Lead makes sure these engagements are scoped, staffed, resourced, and delivered successfully, so research and engineering teams can stay focused on the technical work.

• Own operational scope, resourcing, and execution for external engagements and deployments, from kickoff through completion.

• Translate partner commitments into execution plans that define milestones, owners, staffing, robot allocation, and site requirements.

• Lead complex, long-running engagements involving multiple teams, evolving requirements, and significant operational responsibility.

• Build trusted relationships with partner stakeholders and work through their requirements, approvals, schedules, and site constraints.

• Stand up new sites, bringing together operators, fleet support, equipment, logistics, and site access.

• Plan staffing and coverage across robots, shifts, and locations, and step in directly on site when needed.

• Drive readiness ahead of key milestones, including dry runs, bring-up checks, inventory, and fleet and infrastructure coverage.

• Prioritize and allocate robots, people, and support across concurrent engagements, and flag when a commitment needs to change.

• Keep partners, researchers, and leadership aligned on status, risks, escalations, and decisions.

• Build repeatable playbooks and processes, and grow the team that carries them forward as the work scales.

This role sits at the intersection of program management, field operations, and partner delivery. We're looking for someone who has owned operational outcomes on the ground, can lead several engagements at once, and can step into whichever one needs attention.

• 5+ years of experience in program management, field operations, technical project management, or similar roles.

• Track record of launching and running physical operations, such as opening new sites, markets, or facilities, leading hardware deployments, or running on-site programs for enterprise customers.

• Experience owning delivery of external partners or customer programs end to end.

• Experience staffing and leading teams across shifts and locations.

• Ability to quickly understand technical goals and work through tradeoffs with researchers, engineers, and external partners.

• Strong judgment under pressure, including knowing when to escalate and when to push back on commitments we cannot keep.

• Willingness to travel frequently and work extended stretches on site.

• Experience supporting AI, robotics, autonomous vehicles, or hardware organizations.

• Experience working within large enterprise partner environments, including confidentiality, approvals, and site access requirements.

• Experience turning one-off launches into a repeatable operating motion.

• Experience building operational processes and scaling teams.

• Familiarity with robotics workflows and teleoperation environments.

Pursuant to the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.