Engineering Manager - Autonomy Subsystem Evaluation

The job

LIVE Live feed (private-sector employer) Source: The Muse public API · Data: listed 2026-11-05

Job description

Description

About the Organization

GM has more than 500,000 Super Cruise-equipped vehicles on the road and over 700 million hands-free miles driven. We're now building the next generation of autonomous driving, starting with eyes-off driving on the highway and growing toward point-to-point autonomy. The goal is autonomy that is safe, reliable, comfortable, and scalable across GM's vehicle portfolio.

Autonomy Evaluation helps the AV program figure out where the driver still falls short. Every mile our vehicles drive, on the road or in simulation, carries that signal. We turn it into answers: what is limiting the system, how big each problem is, and what fixing it is worth. Those answers steer what GM's autonomy teams build next and inform software release decisions.

Subsystem Evaluation is one of four teams in Eval Applications, the part of Autonomy Evaluation that turns evaluation into decisions. Each autonomy team measures its own component, usually by accuracy against labels. We answer the question those metrics can't: how much does each subsystem's error actually affect driving? We build metrics for planning, perception, prediction, and localization, including learned components, that reflect their effect on the drive. We also trace driving failures back to the subsystem or interaction that caused them.

The Role

As Manager of Subsystem Evaluation, you'll lead a team of engineers and data scientists and own its roadmap, execution, and staffing. The work is concrete. One example is showing which perception errors change what the car does and which don't. Another is ranking the subsystem failures behind a drop in driving quality, so the right team fixes the right thing first. You'll work with the autonomy teams that use these metrics, with the Driver Performance and Scenario Classification teams, and with the principal and staff engineers who lead evaluation methodology. You'll report to the Senior Manager of Eval Applications.

What You'll Do

• Set the roadmap and quarterly plans for subsystem evaluation, tied to the AV program's milestones and release needs. Decide which subsystems and questions come first, and what to stop.
• Build metrics that weight subsystem errors by their effect on downstream decisions and driving, not by accuracy alone.
• Trace bad driving in simulation and road data back to the subsystem or interaction that caused it, and measure how subsystem errors add up to driving outcomes.
• Give autonomy teams and release reviews a fast, trustworthy answer to whether a software or model change helped or hurt driving, including regression detection and version-to-version comparison.
• Hold the metrics themselves to a high bar. Check them against driving outcomes and human judgment, state their confidence and limits, and retire the ones that don't hold up.
• Apply VLMs and LLMs effectively where applicable in the development/trigaging/etc processes.
• Turn results into clear findings for autonomy teams and leadership: what changed, how confident we are, and what to fix first.

• Hire, develop, and retain engineers and data scientists, with clear expectations, regular feedback, and fair performance management.
• Set clear ownership and steady operating rhythms. Keep the technical bar high through design reviews, code review, testing, and statistically sound analysis.
• Balance near-term program requests against longer-term investments in metrics and methods.
• Build trust with autonomy teams so they act on our metrics. Agree with them on where their component metrics end and ours begin, and resolve disagreements over priorities or conflicting results.

• 8+ years in autonomous systems, robotics, ML evaluation, or applied data science, including hands-on evaluation of planning, perception, prediction, or localization.
• 3+ years managing engineers or data scientists, including hiring and performance management.
• Deep knowledge of autonomy metrics and their limits, such as planner quality measures, detection and tracking metrics, and trajectory prediction metrics. You can tell when a metric improves without the system getting better.
• Strong statistics for evaluation, including sampling, confidence intervals, experimental design, and hypothesis testing on time-series data.
• A disciplined approach to root-causing anomalous data and unexpected system behavior.
• Production Python and SQL experience in team environments, and comfort reviewing designs and code.
• Comfort reading C++ autonomy code to understand what a subsystem actually does.
• Proven ability to build trusted relationships with partner teams and influence them without authority, using data they trust.
• Strong ability to turn ambiguous questions and uncertain results into clear plans and recommendations for engineering and leadership.
• Bachelor's, Master's, or PhD in Computer Science, Robotics, Mechanical or Aerospace Engineering, Machine Learning, Statistics, Data Science, or a related field, or equivalent practical experience.

• Experience in autonomous driving or driver assistance, working with simulation and on-road data, including camera, lidar, and radar.
• Understanding of vehicle dynamics, and planning & controls system design.
• Experience with causal or counterfactual analysis.
• Experience with ML interpretability, such as attribution, ablations, or embedding analysis.
• Strong data-visualization instincts, with the ability to turn high-dimensional metrics into clear views for technical and non-technical audiences.
• Experience leading mixed teams of software engineers and data scientists.

• The salary range for this role is ($218,800 - $335,300). The actual base salary a successful candidate will be offered within this range will vary based on factors relevant to the position.

• Bonus Potential: An incentive pay program offers payouts based on company performance, job level, and individual performance.

Explore around this job

Field: Technology Sub-niche: Software engineering All jobs at General Motors Jobs in California Jobs in Sunnyvale, CA Sunnyvale city guide California state guide Santa Clara County economy

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About the role

This is a Senior Level role in the Technology field (Software engineering) at General Motors. Senior roles usually expect substantial experience, ownership of results and often the ability to guide others.

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How to prepare and behave

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• Read the whole description and match your examples to its requirements; use the same words the posting uses where they are true for you.
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• Answer with short stories: the situation, what you did and the result. Give numbers when you have them and never invent them.
• Be honest about gaps; say what you did to learn and how fast you can close them.
• Ask about the team, the first 90 days, how success is measured and the schedule; do not open with salary and time off.
• When pay comes up, know the market range for the occupation and your lowest acceptable offer before you answer; ask for the full package in writing.
• Send a short thank-you message within a day, mentioning one thing you discussed.
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• Have code, data work or projects you can show, and be ready to think aloud: many technical interviews test how you reason, not only the answer.

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The city

The job is in Sunnyvale, CA. Below is what the official statistics say about living and working there.

How Sunnyvale compares. Among the 145 largest places in California, Sunnyvale is #37 by population, #12 for long commutes (#1 = fewest), #15 for household income (#1 = highest), #129 for rent (#1 = cheapest). Its county, Santa Clara County, is #1 of 58 counties for average pay ($197,043).

The place in numbers

Sunnyvale has 154,236 residents (ACS 2020–2024), about 0.4% of the population of California. It covers 22 square miles of land, which works out to roughly 6,992 people per square mile. The median age is 35.2, 7% younger than the state median (35.2 against 37.9).

Housing

The median gross rent is $3,039 a month (rent plus utilities), 49% above the state median ($3,039 against $2,036). Over a year that is 19.6% of the median household income. US housing guidance treats housing as affordable when it takes 30% of income or less, so the typical household is under that line. The median home value is $1,801,800, which is 9.7 times the median household income ($186,170); a ratio above 5 usually means buying is out of reach without savings or a second income. 43.8% of households own their home, 22% below the state average (43.8% against 55.9%). A low ownership share points to a rental-heavy market with more apartments and shorter stays.

Work and pay

The San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara, CA metropolitan area has 1,134,970 jobs in the BLS wage survey, and the median pay across all occupations is $84,050 a year, 65% above the national median ($84,050 against $50,980). The biggest occupation groups are computer and mathematical (149,970 jobs, median $186,320); management (115,110 jobs, median $210,750); business and financial operations (94,210 jobs, median $125,240). The area is most specialised in computer and mathematical (3.9 times) and architecture and engineering (2.5 times), where the share of workers is well above the national share. The best-paying groups with at least 5,000 jobs are management ($210,750) and legal ($195,190). In 2026M09 the unemployment rate of Santa Clara County was 4.2%. 72.4% of residents aged 16 and over are in the labour force. The city lies in Santa Clara County; its jobs, pay by industry and GDP are on the county page.

Getting around

Among workers, 53.7% drive alone, 4.0% use public transit, 1.6% walk, 29.2% work from home. 9.0% of workers commute 45 minutes or more, 54% below the state average (9.0% against 19.4%). Remote work is more common than in the state as a whole, which widens the set of employers a resident can work for without moving.

People and education

69.3% of adults aged 25 and over hold a bachelor's degree or higher, 87% above the state share (69.3% against 37.1%). 50.2% of residents were born outside the United States, 86% above the state share (50.2% against 27.0%). The poverty rate is 5.8%, 52% below the state rate (5.8% against 12.0%).

Climate

The warmest month is Aug, averaging 68°F (19.8°C), and the coolest is Jan at 47°F (8.3°C). About 510 mm (20 inches) of precipitation falls in a year; Dec is the wettest month (114 mm) and Jul the driest (0 mm). These values come from NASA satellite-based climatology on a grid of about 50 km, so they describe the wider area, not a weather station in the city.

Nearby cities to compare

Closest cities in this guide: Mountain View (3 miles, similar rent); Santa Clara (4 miles, similar rent); Los Altos (4 miles, rent 15% higher); Cupertino (5 miles, rent 15% higher). Rent differences are against Sunnyvale; use the Compare tab to put any two cities side by side.

Full guide to Sunnyvale →California guideAll jobs in Sunnyvale

Official links for Sunnyvale

• Official website of Sunnyvale: sunnyvale.ca.gov
• Census Bureau data profile for Sunnyvale
• Official website of Santa Clara County: santaclaracounty.gov
• Official state website: ca.gov
• BLS Economy at a Glance: California

These links go to official sources and open in a new window. The first one is the government's or company's own site as listed in Wikidata (property "official website"); check it before relying on it.

Where to live

CITY Official statistics Source: U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2020–2024 5-year (via Census Reporter) · Data: ACS 2020–2024

Places within 50 miles (straight line) of Sunnyvale, CA that have a guide, with what living there costs. No pay estimate is shown because the title did not match one occupation.

Career paths

We could not match this title to one occupation, so here are the other sub-niches in Technology, where your skills may carry over:

Cybersecurity (366) Data, analytics and AI (1991) Cloud, IT and infrastructure (504) Product management (412)

Distances

CITY Calculation (straight line) Source: U.S. Census Bureau Gazetteer (coordinates) · Data: 2024

How far Sunnyvale, CA is from the 20 largest US cities, in straight-line miles (not driving distance). Click a column to sort.

Nearby cities with open jobs (within 120 miles)

The employer

General Motors is the employer in this listing. See all its open jobs here →

Company description (from The Muse): At GM, we pioneer the innovations that move and connect people to what matters. Our vision is a world with zero crashes, zero emissions and zero congestion. Our diverse team of over 165,000 employees brings their collective passion for engineering, technology and design to deliver on this ambitious future. And the bold commitments we’ve made are moving us closer to realizing this vision. We firmly believe that each of us has the power to drive meaningful change through our words, actions, and culture. At General Motors, we foster a culture where all ideas are taken into consideration, and where everyone can contribute to their fullest potential. Our foundation is built on respect, integrity, accountability, and equality.

size: Large Size; industries: Consumer Goods & Services, Engineering, Manufacturing, Technology; locations on The Muse: Detroit, MI.

It is among the 200 largest US-headquartered employers in our list, with about 156,000 employees worldwide (2025). Company page with headquarters, state economy and official links →

Official links for General Motors

• Official website of General Motors: gm.com
• SEC EDGAR: company filings search
• Official state website: michigan.gov

These links go to official sources and open in a new window. The first one is the government's or company's own site as listed in Wikidata (property "official website"); check it before relying on it.

The employer's profile on The Muse →

What it is like to work at a company (culture, schedules, benefits) is not in the source data, so we do not describe it. Read the description and ask the questions under "How to prepare".

Other open jobs at General Motors

Similar jobs

Same sub-niche: Software engineering

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FAQ

What is the Engineering Manager - Autonomy Subsystem Evaluation job at General Motors?

A senior level role in technology (software engineering) listed 3 days ago. The full description is on this page and on The Muse.

Where is this job?

Sunnyvale, CA. A remote or flexible location is listed; confirm with the employer which states are accepted.

How do I apply?

Use the "View this job and apply on The Muse" button. AtiveSite does not receive applications.

How much does it pay?

The listing does not publish pay, and we could not match the title to one official occupation.

What is the cost of living there?

Median rent in Sunnyvale is $3,039 a month and median household income $186,170 (ACS 2020–2024).

How old is this listing?

It was posted on 2026-11-05 (3 days ago). Jobs older than 90 days are not shown.

Are there similar jobs?

Yes: browse software engineering jobs in California.

Sources and terms

• Job data: The Muse public API (listing dated 2026-11-05). The job disappears from this site when it disappears from the source.
• Wages and projections: BLS OEWS (May 2025) and Employment Projections 2025–35.
• City and county figures: Census Bureau ACS 2020–2024, BEA, BLS QCEW and LAUS, NASA POWER climatology; distances from Census Gazetteer coordinates.

AtiveSite is not affiliated with or endorsed by The Muse, the employer or any government agency, and does not process applications. Verify every detail with the employer before acting.

Sources

• BLS OEWS (wages and employment by occupation, May 2025)
• BLS Employment Projections 2025–35
• BLS Local Area Unemployment Statistics
• BLS JOLTS
• BLS State and Metro Area Employment
• Census Bureau American Community Survey (via Census Reporter)
• BEA GDP by state and Regional Price Parities
• IRS 2026 tax adjustments
• U.S. Department of Labor, minimum wage by state
• Tax Foundation state income tax rates 2026
• USAJOBS
• USCIS
• U.S. Department of State, visas
• NASA POWER climatology
• GeoNames / Census Gazetteer (coordinates)