On the heels of our most pivotal year at DoorDash, it’s no secret that we have ambitious goals ahead, and we will need a lot of engineering prowess to pull it off. That’s why today, we’re thrilled to announce Ryan Sokol as DoorDash’s new VP of Engineering. Ryan will lead our engineering team, including the product, infrastructure, and data science teams, and will also serve as a member of the Management Team, reporting into Tony Xu, our CEO/co-founder.
Ryan joins us from Uber, where he led and scaled Uber Eats from its inception, overseeing a team of 200+ engineers, and serving on the Uber Eats executive leadership team. Ryan was previously head of engineering at Voxer and has served stints at Genentech, IBM and smaller technology consultancies including his own.
Ryan comes to DoorDash at a critical inflection point in our business following a breakout year. In 2018 we 5xed our geographic footprint from 600 to 3,300 cities and tripled our valuation to more than $4 billion. We doubled the engineering team to 200+ last year, working on a variety of problems from machine learning applications to logistics to personalizing consumer experiences. This year, we plan to double our team again and continue on our trajectory as the fastest growing last-mile logistics company in the space.
To get to know him better, here is a quick Q&A with Ryan:
Your number one reason for joining DoorDash?
I’m joining DoorDash to help an amazing team reach new heights. All of my interactions and diligence with those I trust would lead me to believe that DoorDash is poised to be one of the most influential companies on the planet. I’m most looking forward to learning from some of the best and applying my accumulated knowledge to help DoorDash fast forward its tech to the future and realize its full potential as soon as possible.
Any contrarian viewpoints that have helped you navigate your career?
I have always stuck out like a sore thumb in manager meetings throughout my career and like to think of myself as an engineer in manager’s clothing. I’m heavily biased for action and believe that an actionable decision is almost always better than deferment. I’ve been a fierce advocate for diversity in engineering before it was cool and have found myself swimming upstream for most of my career in this regard. I’m irked by waste, repetitive manual tasks and bullies. On the flip, I love optimizing processes, software and relationships to be as efficient as possible in the aim of achieving greatness.
What are you reading right now?
“7 Powers” by Hamilton Helmer at Tony’s suggestion and “Becoming” by Michelle Obama, because she’s awesome.
Most important career advice you’ve received?
Interestingly I found that meaningful advice rarely comes when you ask for it, but reflection can be a powerful tool in steering one’s career. Having the discipline to look back to seek, admit and own one’s failures is the best way to grow. Doing this in the surroundings of an accountable but blameless culture makes it even easier. Highly accountable and blameless cultures are hard to come by and if you ever find one, hang on tight because good things are bound to happen.
Tell us one fact about you somebody couldn’t find on your LinkedIn or resume.
I used to have an irrational obsession with speed, which manifested itself in me taking every vehicle I owned to its maximum velocity.
I aspire to be a classic car mechanic when I’m super old—as opposed to regular old like I am right now. Problem is, I’m not good at it.
I want to run for local office in the next decade.
You have our vote, Ryan. Welcome to the DoorDash family!
5 Questions With DoorDash’s New Vice President of Engineering, Ryan Sokol was originally published in DoorDash on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.