Associate Manager, AI Research Lab Strategy & Operations

About The Team

AI Research Lab is one of DoorDash’s frontier innovation hubs, focusing on building the foundation for an AI-native future across consumers, merchants, and dashers. Operating at the center of technical exploration and real-world execution, the Lab connects frontier model research with internal platform investments, operator teams, and strategic external partners.

About The Role

As an Associate Manager, Strategy & Operations on our AI Research Lab, you will play a central role in converting frontier AI advancements into shipped products and scalable infrastructure. You will operate across research, product, and operations to move from early discovery and experimentation to deployment and impact. This role sits at the intersection of customer insight, technical innovation, and business execution.

• Reimagining core experiences through AI, partnering directly with in-field merchants, sales, support, product, and engineering teams.
• Own revenue-driving AI initiatives, operating as the accountable business owner for high-priority AI bets and ensuring clear linkage between technical progress and financial outcomes.
• Lead business planning cycles, developing go-to-market strategies for AI-powered products and capabilities, overseeing execution through structured project plans, resource allocation, and KPI tracking.
• Develop new business metrics and measurement frameworks, including: defining what should be measured and why, establishing performance thresholds using data-driven benchmarking, localizing metrics across geographies and market types, driving AI adoption across DoorDash by enabling non-technical teams with enterprise tools, workflows, and experimentation sandboxes that integrate AI into daily operations.
• Operationalize frontier technologies from external partners, translating research breakthroughs into revenue-generating product capabilities and production systems.
• Lead rapid experimentation cycles, validating product-market fit, measuring business impact, and ensuring AI initiatives translate into tangible outcomes.

Compensation

The successful candidate’s starting pay will fall within the pay range listed below and is determined based on job-related factors including, but not limited to, skills, experience, qualifications, work location, and market conditions. Base salary is localized according to an employee’s work location. Ranges are market-dependent and may be modified in the future. In addition to base salary, the compensation for this role includes opportunities for equity grants. Talk to your recruiter for more information.

Benefits

DoorDash cares about you and your overall well-being. That’s why we offer a comprehensive benefits package to all regular employees, which includes a 401(k) plan with employer matching, 16 weeks of paid parental leave, wellness benefits, commuter benefits match, paid time off and paid sick leave in compliance with applicable laws (e.g. Colorado Healthy Families and Workplaces Act).

We also offer medical, dental, and vision benefits, 11 paid holidays, disability and basic life insurance, family-forming assistance, and a mental health program, among others. To learn more about our benefits, visit our careers page here.

Paid Time Off

To learn more about our paid time off details, please refer to the section titled 'About The Team'.

Notice to Applicants for Jobs Located in NYC or Remote Jobs Associated With Office in NYC Only

If you need any accommodations, please inform your recruiting contact upon initial connection.