Lead Technical Program Manager, Platform Engineering

A home is the biggest investment most people make, and yet, it doesn’t come with a manual. That's why we’re building the only app homeowners need to effortlessly manage their homes —  knowing what to do, when to do it, and who to hire. With Thumbtack, millions of people care for what matters most, and pros earn billions of dollars through our platform. And as one of the fastest-growing companies in a $600B+ industry — we must be doing something right. 

We are driven by a common goal and the deep satisfaction that comes from knowing our work supports local economies, helps small businesses grow, and brings homeowners peace of mind. We’re seeking people who continually put our purpose first: advocating for pros and customers, embracing change, and choosing teamwork every day.

At Thumbtack, we're creating a new era of home care. If making an impact and the chance to do good inspires you, join us. Imagine what we’ll build together. 

Thumbtack by the Numbers

• Available nationwide in every U.S. county
• 80 million projects started on Thumbtack
• 10 million 5-star reviews fand counting
• Pros earn billions on our platform
• 1000+ employees 
• $3.2 billion valuation (June, 2021) 

About the Technical Program Management and Engineering Teams

Technical Program Management is a collaborative, engaging team with a high motor and strong domain and technical expertise.  We partner with engineering and teams across the business to drive discovery, prioritization, implementation, improvement, and ongoing management of high impact technical solutions and programs.  It’s our mission to help all of Thumbtack scale and get more done through technology and cross-functional alignment.

At Thumbtack, engineers at every level build products and systems that directly impact our customers and professionals. Our challenges span a wide variety of areas, ranging from architecting sound data and infrastructure to be leveraged across the company, to building search and booking experiences, to optimizing pricing systems, to building tools to help professionals grow their businesses. We believe in tackling these hard problems together as a team, with strong values around collaboration, ownership, and transparency. To read more about the hard problems that our team is taking on, visit our engineering blog.

About the Role

Thumbtack is looking for an experienced Technical Program Manager to build out and manage a program that delivers the technology strategy and roadmap for our Platform Engineering organization.  As the first dedicated TPM to this area at Thumbtack, we’re looking for the right person who’s excited about the unique and high impact opportunity to build something special.  You will lead complex, multi-disciplinary projects in a program that spans critical systems & application infrastructure, data & machine learning systems, developer experience and productivity, and vendor-managed services and platforms.  You will provide input and direction on solution design and prioritization, clarify outcomes and metrics, manage schedules and dependencies, and communicate progress with stakeholders and business leaders on initiatives that impact our internal and external users – from deployment of new technology, to large-scale infrastructure migrations, to definition of new processes, to enforcement of security policies, reliability measures, and data governance.

Responsibilities

• Partner with engineering leadership to develop a Platform Engineering program strategy, drive semi-annual planning to identify objectives and key results that support that strategy, and collaborate with engineering, product, data science, IT, and others to prioritize and resource dependent initiatives
• Collaborate with engineering, product, data science, and relevant business teams to develop comprehensive and actionable plans, manage complex cross-team dependencies, and implement scalable tools, infrastructure, automation, and processes
• Utilize agile project management framework and techniques to plan, document, and manage both strategic and tactical initiatives from conception through delivery and closure
• Keep cross-functional stakeholders, contributors, executives, and interested parties engaged, aligned on strategy and involvement, and up-to-date on relevant details; escalate issues when necessary
• Ensure proper project closure by troubleshooting and resolving outstanding issues after launch, confirming solutions are in an acceptable state, and evaluating outcomes against objectives

What you'll need 

If you don't think you meet all of the criteria below but still are interested in the job, please apply. Nobody checks every box, and we're looki