System Safety Engineer, Operations & Fleet Response

About the role

The Waymo Safety team works to promote and help to continuously improve the safety of Waymo's fully autonomous driving technology. Our experts develop safety goals and strategies, and conduct safety engineering analyses to ensure safety is being considered throughout the design and development of our vehicles. The team develops and promotes safety strategies and policies for autonomous vehicles for its work with regulatory authorities, lawmakers, law enforcement and public and non-profit organizations. Our Safety Team also helps advise on compliance with applicable environmental, health, and safety regulations.

Responsibilities

• Lead cross-functional efforts to perform safety analyses and identify potential hazards and their causes, assess safety risks (qualitatively and quantitatively), support the definition of safety requirements, inform design decisions, propose mitigations, and support verification strategies
• Participate in hardware, software, and operations design and readiness reviews and discussions to help ensure that safety mitigations and requirements are addressed and ensure the safety mitigations are working effectively in the field
• Provide guidance on the adoption and adaptation of relevant safety standards, and industry best practices, and help ensure Waymo and its partners comply with relevant safety regulations
• Evaluates the continued effectiveness of implemented risk control strategies; supports the identification of new hazards
• Provide leadership in defining, implementing, and improving relevant System Safety processes while promoting our safety culture inside Waymo
• Provide leadership in integrating the System Safety Methodology with other methodologies of the Waymo safety framework

Requirements

• Bachelor of Science in Electrical/Mechatronics/Aerospace Engineering, Computer Engineering, Computer Science, or related technical fields
• Strong technical project management skills with the ability to manage multiple parallel projects
• 7+ years of relevant engineering work experience that includes minimum 5 years of System Safety engineering
• Proficient in selecting and performing appropriate inductive/deductive safety analyses in order to efficiently identify hazards and their level of risk
• Proficient in applying Systems Engineering principles including defining SMART safety mitigations/requirements and collaborating on effective verification and validation methods
• Extensive background in risk management and aligning risk based decisions with stakeholders

Qualifications

• A Master’s degree or PhD in Electrical/Mechatronics/Aerospace Engineering, Computer Engineering, Computer Science, or related technical fields is preferred
• Experience in complex, safety critical fleet operations and the impact to hardware, software, and systems design is preferred

Skills

• Ability to manage multiple parallel projects
• Expertise in System Safety engineering
• Knowledge of risk management and stakeholder alignment
• Experience in complex, safety critical fleet operations
• Proficiency in inductive/deductive safety analyses and Systems Engineering principles

Benefits

• Health, dental, vision insurance
• Retirement Benefits: 401(k) with company match
• Paid Time Off: 20 days of vacation per year, accruing at a rate of 6.15 hours per pay period for the first five years of employment
• Sick Time: 40 hours/year (statutory, where applicable); 5 days/event (discretionary)
• Maternity Leave (Short-Term Disability + Baby Bonding): 28-30 weeks
• Baby Bonding Leave: 18 weeks
• Holidays: 13 paid days per year

Pay

The expected base salary range for this full-time position across US locations is $196,000—$248,000 USD. Actual starting pay will be based on job-related factors, including exact work location, experience, relevant training and education, and skill level.

Schedule

This role is hybrid, with the option to work remotely up to 50% of the time.