Technical leadership across AI research, devices, and platforms

Ambitious technology needs an operating system for execution.

I build the operating systems that help technical organizations make better decisions, manage critical dependencies, and turn ambitious ideas into reliable launches.

My work spans AI research at the Chan Zuckerberg Biohub and two decades across Google, Nest, Wear OS, Pixel Watch, Assistant, and developer platforms.

Amanda Surya
§01 · About

I work on the systems behind ambitious technical work

I began my career as a software engineer, and I still approach organizations as systems: understanding where information is lost, where decisions stall, where ownership becomes unclear, and where local incentives work against the larger goal.

Over the past two decades, I have worked at the boundaries between disciplines. I helped build Google's early developer ecosystem, led programs spanning Nest's apps, cloud services, and developer platform, and built the technical program organization responsible for aligning hundreds of people across Wear OS, Pixel Watch, and Android Health.

Today, I apply those lessons in AI research for biology. The underlying questions are different from consumer technology: progress is less predictable, the path to impact is longer, and scientific quality cannot be reduced to a ship date. But the leadership challenge is familiar: creating enough structure for teams to move together without constraining the exploration that produces breakthroughs.

My work focuses on three questions:

How should organizations operate when the work is technically uncertain?

What does effective program leadership look like when research, engineering, data, and infrastructure are deeply interdependent?

How can leaders create clarity and accountability without adding unnecessary process?

I believe technical program management is most valuable when it improves the quality of decisions, not merely the visibility of tasks.

§02 · Writings

Writings on technical execution

Team Culture

How to build a culture of continuous improvement

Continuous improvement is not a value on a wall. It is scalable frameworks, tracked metrics, and a culture that makes urgency and ownership the default.

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Operating Model

Redefining TPM practice for the AI era

Three shifts every TPM organization needs to make: from manual tracking to automation, from reporting to decision enablement, and from coordination to execution leverage.

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AI

AI automates coordination. It does not automate organizational judgment.

Two jobs have been hiding inside the word "manager" for decades. The relay work is being absorbed by machines. What's left is the part that was always hardest to hire for.

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AI

Why the age of AI needs TPMs more, not less

AI is coming for the trackers and the status decks. Good. What's left is the judgment, and demand for that just went up.

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Program Management

The real output of program leadership is better decisions

Not schedules, not dashboards. If you want to know whether a program team is working, look at the quality of the decisions coming out of it.

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Program Management

TPM is a leadership discipline, not a support function

Tracking the work is table stakes. The TPMs who matter shape what gets built and in what order. Here's how to grow into that.

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Execution

What shipping a smartwatch taught me about cross-functional execution

Hardware deadlines don't move. Lessons from Pixel Watch and Wear OS on aligning hardware, software, health science, and regulators on one ship date.

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AI for Science

From consumer tech to curing disease: why TPMs belong in science

Research moves differently than product. What consumer-tech operating discipline can, and can't, offer mission-driven scientific organizations.

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§03 · Selected work
Chan Zuckerberg Biohub · 2025 – Present

Director, Technical Program Management, AI Research

Flagship launch: the Biohub's world model of protein biology (May 2026): ESMC, ESMFold2, and ESM Atlas. The largest open application of AI to protein biology to date · coverage in Nature
Google · 2019 – 2025

Sr Manager TPM & Chief of Staff, Wear OS · Pixel Watch · Android Health

Shipped: Wear OS 3, 4 & 5 · Pixel Watch 1, 2 & 3 · Samsung Galaxy Watch 4, 5, 6 & 7 · Xiaomi Watch 2 · OnePlus Watch 2
Google · 2018 – 2019

Sr Manager, Technical Program Management, Google Assistant

Nest · 2014 – 2018

Head of Apps & Services Engineering Program Management

Google · 2006 – 2014

Manager, Developer Relations, YouTube · Google Wallet · Google TV · Maps · Android

§04 · Speaking, Mentoring & Advising

Speaking & panels

I speak on technical program management, launching frontier AI models, cross-functional leadership, and career paths for technical women. Past appearances include Google I/O and Google developer events worldwide, and I co-authored Building Web Apps for Google TV for O'Reilly Media.

Mentoring

I co-founded Women Techmakers, Google's global initiative for women in technology, and continue to mentor TPMs, engineering leaders, and early-career technologists, with a particular commitment to advancing women and underrepresented groups in technical leadership.

Advising

I advise teams and organizations standing up or scaling program management functions: from first-TPM hires to launch playbooks, release trains, and org design for AI research and product execution at scale.

§05 · Contact

Get in touch

For speaking invitations, mentoring, advising, or just to compare notes on program leadership. I'd love to hear from you.