Megan Neese’s career is driving her back to Pittsburgh

Waymo’s plan to bring its fleet of autonomous ride-hailing cars to Pittsburgh in 2025 didn’t feel like an expansion to Megan Neese.

For the Carnegie Mellon University alum and Pittsburgh native, it felt like a homecoming.

“It feels different when it comes home,” she says. “My family has the opportunity to experience what I've been working on.”

Megan, who earned degrees from CMU’s College of Fine Arts in 2004 and the College of Engineering in 2005, is head of research insights at Waymo. In that role, she is helping shape the autonomous vehicle experience for the people who ride in them and the teams that build them.

It’s been quite a ride for Megan to this point in her career, and the road has had its share of twists and turns.

From metal to industrial

In high school, Megan was a metalsmith, spending her time making jewelry. That interest in fabrication might’ve lived on as just a hobby had it not been for an ABC “Nightline” segment on IDEO, the influential design firm known for rethinking everything from shopping carts to medical devices. After seeing the program, she began to consider a career in industrial design.

“It felt kind of analogous to metalsmithing, very hands-on, very creative,” she says. “But it also felt like a much bigger scale.”

That moment set her on a search for industrial design programs, eventually leading her to CMU. Even when she was accepted, she wasn’t entirely sure she belonged.

“I was really nervous,” Megan says, “I was worried they wouldn’t understand why jewelry is design.”

That fear was unfounded. Instead, Megan found a cohort very much like herself: Hat makers, illustrators and creatives who were all hoping to dive deeper into industrial design.

“I showed up at CMU, and they gave me a schedule; it was all design,” says Megan. “And I was like, ‘Oh, I’m going to learn this.’”

The intensity suited her.

“It felt like I was burying my head right into this topic that I had come to learn,” she says. “There was always someone in the studio; it felt like a second home.”

Only later did she fully appreciate another defining aspect of her time at CMU: the people.

“What I learned later was that being so immersed with this cohort, they became a lifelong network,” she says. “My first three jobs were all from this group.”

Changing lanes

After graduating, that network led her to CMU spinoff Bright Innovation, a start-up product development firm, making the transition from student to professional almost seamless. The work was exciting and collaborative, but not especially lucrative.

“I was living on my mom’s couch,” she says, laughing.

Soon, another CMU connection opened a door to automaker Nissan, and Megan headed to Los Angeles, despite not being a “lifelong car person” at the time.

Her entry point into automotive came at CMU through a student project with International Trucking, designing vehicle interiors.

“I really like big projects, and cars are big projects,” she says.

Megan started at Nissan in the early days of electrification. That meant advocating for electric vehicles long before they were widely accepted. Her work was future-focused, helping company leaders imagine what mobility could become and how cars might change as demand for electric vehicles grew.

“I spent a lot of my early career convincing executives that electrification was actually going to manifest,” she says, adding that it did with the creation of the Nissan Leaf, the world’s first mass-market electric vehicle.

Given her history with cars and innovation, it’s no surprise to find Megan at the forefront of autonomous vehicles at Waymo.

“I felt like I was about to do the same thing again,” she says. “I want to try to imagine and explain and inspire people to think about this new future.”

The difference, she found, was context. At Waymo, she stepped into an environment already oriented toward the future. Instead of a company rooted in history and execs she’d have to convince, she found leadership willing to take big bets and a culture that looked forward instead of back.

“Waymo is willing to take bigger risks,” she says, “and that is very exciting. Everyone has some touchpoint with transportation. Making changes to certain problems in a positive way has the potential to impact billions of people. It’s very gratifying to work on.” Today, she leads a team responsible for understanding how people interact with autonomous technology at every level. The work spans traditional research methods — surveys, focus groups and ride-alongs — as well as deeper explorations of user experience, like service design and even the tools engineers use to build and test the system.

“The first 20 years of my career were the rise of electrification,” she says. “Now I feel like I’m in the second chapter with autonomous.”

That chapter is now unfolding, in part, on the streets where she grew up. And she has plenty of chances to see it there.

A round-trip journey

Megan returns to Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon fairly often. Each time, she sees her experience in a new light.

“You don’t realize what’s unique about your education until you’re working,” she says.

Every visit brings a renewed appreciation for the university’s interdisciplinary approach and the students who continue to push its boundaries. That time spent in the studio working with her peers created not only a lifelong passion for design but also a strong sense of collaboration that she brings to the workplace and continues to share with her former classmates.

And as for her research with Waymo, Pittsburgh has proven to be a perfect training ground for showcasing the technology’s growth. With its bridges, hills and famously idiosyncratic streets, the city delivers a demanding experience for training autonomous cars.

“We feel like the Waymo driver is ready for an environment like that.”

But it’s about more than just steep streets; it’s the riders that use them. It’s a market filled with technologists and engineers keen to provide feedback on the product, she says.

“Pittsburgh feels like a place where people are pretty aware of what’s changing and evolving, and they have opinions.”

And Megan is listening.