Incident Response Manager

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.

In this role you will be hybrid based in either Phoenix, Mountain View, New York City or San Francisco, and report into our Incident Response Program Manager. Remote candidates will also be considered.

You will:

• Lead as the Incident Commander during cross-functional incidents - orchestrating response efforts, making decisive real-time decisions, and coordinating all necessary stakeholders to safely and efficiently resolve events.
• Manage and prioritize escalations - ensuring targeted stakeholder representation (e.g., Legal, Ops, Safety, Policy, & Communications) throughout the incident lifecycle.
• Develop robust cross-functional partnerships - to proactively understand stakeholder concerns during events and effectively communicate post-incident outcomes and learning opportunities to a global audience.
• Collaborate closely with global Operations teams - providing critical support and guidance during real-time incident response to maintain seamless 24/7 coverage.
• Drive continuous improvement - by leading thorough incident retrospectives to accurately document events and identify root causes. Define actionable follow-ups and track their implementation to continuously enhance safety, efficiency, and overall incident response capabilities for a distributed team, ensuring lessons learned are integrated back into processes.
• Deliver executive-level communications - on active incidents and present comprehensive analyses of key outcomes, trends, and strategic learnings from past events.

You have:

• 5+ years of direct experience in incident management, having served as an Incident Commander or lead responder for high-severity, cross-functional incidents within a complex operational environment.
• Proven technical expertise & cross-functional leadership, apply technical understanding of complex engineering systems to drive incident response, root cause analysis, and remediation for live operational incidents, coupled with an exceptional ability to build and align diverse stakeholders (e.g., Engineering, Legal, Operations) during critical events.
• Demonstrated capability to remain calm and decisive under pressure, efficiently coordinating response efforts and making sound judgments in rapidly evolving, high-stakes situations.
• Experience briefing senior executives and leadership, in real-time, on complex, fast-moving incidents, articulating technical details, impact, and proposed resolutions clearly and concisely across various communication channels.
• Exceptional attention to detail with a track record of meticulously documenting incident timelines, contributing factors, and post-incident analysis to drive accurate reporting and continuous improvement.
• Willingness and ability to participate in a 24/7 on-call rotation, demonstrating flexibility to cover shifts as part of a global "follow the sun" incident response capability.

We prefer:

• Advanced degree in a relevant field such as Emergency Management, Business, Operations, Law, or a related discipline, demonstrating a deeper theoretical understanding of incident dynamics and organizational response.
• Experience leading crisis and incident response as an Incident Commander in large-scale or high-impact environments.
• Proven ability to effectively interact with and/or report to external stakeholders, including law enforcement, regulatory agencies, and legal counsel, during sensitive or high-profile incidents.
• Experience in highly regulated industries such as Automotive, Maritime, Aviation, or similar sectors, providing familiarity with safety-critical systems, compliance frameworks, and complex operational procedures.
• Certifications/alignment on relevant incident management best practices and frameworks (e.g., NIMS/ICS, ITIL Incident Management, or similar), indicating a structured approach to incident handling and continuous improvement.
• Experience with event mapping initiatives to enhance incident action planning, ensure congruence with response team actions, and promote stakeholder coordination.

Travel: 

• ~10% travel (Domestic & International)

Please Note: This role works with sensitive content or situations and may be exposed to graphic, controversial, and/or upsetting topics or content.