Principal Product Manager, Kitchen Technology & Innovation

Toast creates technology to help restaurants and local businesses succeed in a digital world, helping business owners operate, increase sales, engage customers, and keep employees happy. The Principal Product Manager for Kitchen Technology & Innovation will own the KDS product strategy and delivery, focusing on enterprise workflows and AI-powered insights to enhance kitchen operations.

Responsibilities:

• Own and drive the KDS product strategy — enterprise workflow depth, data differentiation, SMB attach growth, and the agentic AI roadmap — connecting investments to Toast's kitchen adoption vision and near-term business outcomes including ARR growth, support ticket reduction, and enterprise retention
• Define where agentic AI creates real value in the kitchen: proactive prep time adjustments based on real-time order load, automatic kitchen configuration changes tied to labor schedules or ordering channel mix, intelligent ticket routing and load balancing — and build the investment case to pursue the highest-leverage bets
• Own KDS delivery end-to-end, working directly with large restaurant groups to translate complex, high-stakes workflow requirements into scalable product decisions that serve the whole market
• Lead the KDS kitchen data strategy: define what kitchen efficiency insights should look like for operators at every scale, from API-first analytics for enterprise operators to actionable reporting for SMBs, and sequence the investments to unlock it
• Shape and validate the business case for the next-generation KDS strategy — the long-horizon bets that drive future growth

Requirements:

• Proven experience defining and owning product strategy for a complex, operationally critical product — bonus points if it spans hardware and software and/or have experience in food & beverage
• Creative and strategic: you don't just optimize existing products — you identify the next meaningful bet, make the case for it, and drive it from zero to conviction
• Curiosity and a point of view on AI and agentic product opportunities in operational environments — you don't need to have shipped an agent, but you should have a clear perspective on where autonomous action creates real value vs. real risk
• Track record of working directly with enterprise customers, translating nuanced, high-stakes workflow requirements into product decisions that scale well beyond a single logo
• Strong instincts for the SMB operator: you understand what it means to run a restaurant kitchen without a data analyst, an IT team, or a change management budget — and you can build for that reality
• Executive presence to drive alignment without authority across engineering, design, enterprise customer success, sales, and product leadership in a high-stakes, cross-functional environment