Operations Manager

About Us

Foundry Robotics is building an AI-native robotics manufacturing company focused on deploying advanced assembly and production capability for leading robotics companies and national-security-critical hardware. Basically, we’re building robots that build robots.

We are reimagining manufacturing through advanced robotics. Our mission is to rebuild the American manufacturing industry as an AI-first, assembly-focused, dual-use contract manufacturer. We aim to empower manufacturers with intelligent, efficient, and adaptable robotic systems that redefine productivity and quality.

The Role

This role is for an Operations Manager who thrives on building and running a high-performance contractor workforce, equally comfortable designing onboarding programs from first principles and walking the floor to fix what's broken in real time. You will own the people-and-process layer that turns billable contractor hours into delivered, usable data, managing 50+ operators executing UMI gripper, egocentric, and VR teleop data collection against real customer contracts. You will stand up workforce operations from scratch and drive rapid build-test-learn cycles to deliver an operation that is both rigorous and scalable.

You will partner closely with the Technical Program Manager, Robotics Data, to own rig calibration, QA spec, and the data pipeline handoff. Together you are accountable for whether the floor ships what the model teams need.

Key Responsibilities

• Own the end-to-end workforce lifecycle for 50+ operators, including sourcing, screening, hiring, onboarding, certification, performance management, and offboarding

• Run the daily operations cadence, including shift planning, station assignments, breaks, and coverage

• Manage shift leads (3–5 direct reports) and operate escalation paths into engineering

• Build and review operator scorecards weekly, tracking success rate, rejection rate, and throughput, surfacing and managing the 60–95% quality variance common across operators

• Design and execute a quality-first incentive structure

• Build the onboarding curriculum and certification gating, ensuring no operator captures production data until certified on the rig and task

• Run live floor QA, catching issues in real time against SOPs co-authored with the TPM

• Execute operator training, certification, and pilot batch readiness when new tasks ramp up

• Own fleet readiness on the floor, including daily rig health checks, in-shift swaps, spares staging, and ensuring every station is production-ready at shift start

• Own contractor timekeeping, the payroll vendor relationship, and floor logistics including layout, station configuration, supplies, badging, safety, EHS, and facilities

• Manage VR teleop floor logistics, including headset hygiene, motion sickness rotation policies, and controller battery and charging logistics

• Run a continuous improvement program (Kaizen / 6S) focused on throughput, ergonomics, and station efficiency

• Build the career ladder for top operators (operator → senior → trainer → shift lead)

• Define and report against operations-level OKRs for throughput, quality, and operator performance

• Enforce data governance on the floor, ensuring operators handle customer data per contractual and regulatory requirements

What We're Looking For

Founder mentality: We love people who build like it’s their own company. You move fast, take ownership, and find a way through when the path isn’t obvious. You have the drive to make big things happen and the judgment to take smart risks along the way. If you prefer a clearly defined lane, a predictable pace, and all the answers before you start, there’s nothing wrong with that—but Foundry might not be the right fit.

• 3–5 years managing a contractor or hourly workforce of 30+ in a high-throughput operations environment (data collection, AV ops, manufacturing, fulfillment, clinical trials, field ops)

• Proven ability to build workforce operations from the ground up and improve on existing programs

• Comfortable owning operator scorecards, SOP execution, and standardization

• Equally effective at a desk and on the floor, with deep hands-on experience running a shift and solving problems in real time

• Track record tracking and improving operational metrics (throughput, quality, retention, certification rates)

• Experience designing onboarding, certification, and performance management programs in a cross-functional environment

• Collaborative by nature, you consider downstream impacts on data quality, engineering, and operators when making operational decisions

• Bias toward action, scrappy problem solving, and moving fast without sacrificing rigor

Why Join Us?

This is one of the only places where world-class manufacturing operators, mechanical engineers, robotics researchers, and software engineers sit in the same room — building production systems together.

We are committed to being deeply embedded in the U.S. industrial base. Our focus is simple: build adaptive robotic assembly systems that make American manufacturing scalable, resilient, and competitive again.

If you want to run a mature, well-defined commercial org, this may not be the role.

If you want to build the commercial engine that brings AI-driven manufacturing to every industrial and energy customer in America — this is it.

The base salary range for this full-time position in the location of Emeryville is:

$150,000—$250,000 USD

Compensation packages at Foundry Robotics for eligible roles include base salary, equity, and benefits. The range displayed on each job posting reflects the minimum and maximum target for new hire salaries for the position, determined by work location and additional factors, including job-related skills, experience, interview performance, and relevant education or training. Foundry Robotics employees in eligible roles are also granted equity based compensation, subject to Board of Director approval. You'll also receive benefits including, but not limited to: Comprehensive health, dental and vision coverage, and generous PTO.

Foundry Robotics is an equal opportunity employer. We evaluate all applicants without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, veteran status, or any other protected characteristic.