Operational Risk Manager

Waymo is an autonomous driving technology company with the mission to be the world's most trusted driver. Since its start as the Google Self-Driving Car Project in 2009, Waymo has focused on building the Waymo Driver—The World's Most Experienced Driver™—to improve access to mobility while saving thousands of lives now lost to traffic crashes. The Waymo Driver powers Waymo’s fully autonomous ride-hail service and can also be applied to a range of vehicle platforms and product use cases. The Waymo Driver has provided over ten million rider-only trips, enabled by its experience autonomously driving over 100 million miles on public roads and tens of billions in simulation across 15+ U.S. states. We are looking for a systems-minded Operational Risk Manager to mature and scale our day-to-day risk and safety infrastructure. This isn't about running periodic checklists; it’s about turning operational data and playbooks into a live, predictive engine that actively shapes our product roadmap. In this role, you’ll embed directly with cross-functional teams to build the operational standards that allow us to scale safely and seamlessly. This role follows a hybrid work schedule and reports to the Head of Operations Safety & Readiness. You will: Mature & Publish Playbooks: Review, refine, and publish operational playbooks, ensuring they remain the accurate, optimized "source of truth." Day-to-Day Risk Management: Oversee continuous monitoring of operational risks, lead root cause investigations, and ensure compliance with our Safety Management System (SMS) and risk frameworks. Risk Register Ownership: Maintain, update, and govern the operational risk register, ensuring all tracked risks have clear owners, mitigation strategies, and regular status updates. Product Liaison: Translate day-to-day operational risk data, predictive analysis, and trends into nuanced requirements that secure roadmap prioritization from Product teams. Systems-Based Thinking: You analyze how our daily workflows interact, identifying bottlenecks or weak points in current frameworks to optimize the entire ecosystem. You have: Experience: 5+ years of Operational experience, with a focus on managing or maturing risk/operational workflows. Education: Bachelor's Degree in a relevant field or equivalent practical experience. Tools & Framework Tracking: Direct experience with Jira and structured requirements tracking to manage operational priorities, action items, and cross-functional deliverables. Safety Framework Knowledge: Practical working knowledge of Safety Management Systems (SMS) principles and their application in fast-paced, live operational environments. Process Improvement & Systems Thinking: Proven track record of evaluating complex workflows, identifying failure modes, and authoring clear, comprehensive operational documentation. Communication & Collaboration: Exceptional written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to build trust, align diverse stakeholders, and influence without formal authority. We prefer: Prior experience in the Autonomous Vehicle (AV) industry. Operational risk or safety assurance experience within high-reliability and safety-critical industries (e.g., commercial aviation, defense, aerospace, rail/transit, energy, or complex fleet logistics). Experience with root-cause analysis methodologies (e.g., 5-Whys, Fishbone/Ishikawa, FMEA) and developing predictive operational indicators. Travel requirements: 20% The expected base salary range for this full-time position across US locations is listed below. Actual starting pay will be based on job-related factors, including exact work location, experience, relevant training and education, and skill level. Your recruiter can share more about the specific salary range for the role location or, if the role can be performed remote, the specific salary range for your preferred location, during the hiring process. Waymo employees are also eligible to participate in Waymo’s discretionary annual bonus program, equity incentive plan, and generous Company benefits program, subject to eligibility requirements. Salary Range $159,000 — $196,000 USD