Sr. Director, Product Operations

Job Overview:

The Sr. Director, Product Operations is a strategic, detail oriented leader responsible for orchestrating how product strategy and roadmaps are successfully executed across the portfolio. This role oversees both the Project Management and a new Product Investment Analytics function, including project staffing and capacity/productivity reporting, timekeeping & budget analytics, project/program management, and strategic investment decision support.

The ideal candidate will improve predictability and visibility in how product investments are allocated, establish alignment of investments with bookings-based returns, increase velocity in our development and release cadences, and demonstrate quantifiable value realization via transparent data analyses and exceptional cross-functional alignment.

Core Competencies:

• Strategic Thinking & Systems Orientation: Connects portfolio strategy to execution; designs scalable operating models.
• Operational Excellence: Builds efficient, repeatable processes; drives the use of data and metrics to improve performance.
• Data-Driven Decision Making: Analyses and applies evidence to inform and shape priorities, trade-offs, and investments.
• Leadership & Influence: Leads through clarity and influence; coaches and grows people and teams.
• Cross-Functional Collaboration: Orchestrates alignment across diverse groups; thrives on team wins.
• Customer-Centricity: Elevates educator and learner insights to guide design and delivery quality.

Job Responsibilities:

Product Operations Leadership (Staffing, Timekeeping, Budget Analytics):

• Timekeeping & Effort Categorization: Implement and continually refine timekeeping compliance and reporting; ensure accurate project timekeeping and effort categorization for portfolio insights.
• Budget Analytics: Forecast, track, and report portfolio budgets; lead variance analysis, scenario planning, and product margin reviews in partnership with Product Leadership and Finance.
• Operational Performance: Establish operational KPIs, dashboards, and OKRs that illuminate throughput, quality, customer value, and financial performance.
• Productivity Tracking: Articulate and document baseline levels of productivity across product organizations, support teams in implementing tools for scaling work efficiently, track and report productivity increases in alignment with industry standard expectations
• Staffing & Capacity: Own the product staffing model, capacity planning, and allocations across product lines; set utilization targets and coverage plans for critical initiatives.

Process Optimization & Continuous Improvement:

• Systematize & Automate: Optimize systems and processes that enhance efficiency, quality, and cycle time across product development; track and report on the implementation of AI-based tools for productivity enhancements across teams
• Portfolio Retrospectives: Establish a cadence for portfolio-level retrospectives with the goals of identifying churn, removing bottlenecks, and scaling repeatable patterns
• Delivery Practices: Refine and enforce best practices for project management, design, and development; ensuring consistent definitions of acceptance criteria and release cadences

Project Management (Operational & Agile):

• Project Management Ownership: Oversee the project and program management practices; standardize intake, planning, execution, and delivery across teams with clear stage gates and artifacts.
• Agile Maturity: Drive Scaled Agile practices with pragmatic governance across the portfolio segments - implementing streamlined ceremonies, cadences, and metrics that balance flexibility with accountability.
• Portfolio Visibility: Assist in implementing tooling and processes for transparent roadmaps, dependencies, risks, milestones, and cross-functional communication.
• Delivery Assurance: Monitor progress and proactively address delivery risks, scope changes, and impediments; communicate status and recovery plans.

Team Leadership & Talent Development:

• Engineering Partnership: Ensure tight collaboration with Engineering, Architecture, Data/Infrastructure, and Security; champion feasibility, scalability, performance, and reliability.
• Technical Standards: Establish consistent practices for technical documentation, integration specs, contract management; promote testability, observability, and operational readiness.

Decision Support & Insights:

• Evidence-Based Decisions: Provide data-driven insights that influence prioritization, trade-offs, and investment decisions; embed analytics into operating rhythms.