Sr. Manager, Product Operations (contract)

DEPARTMENT: National Program

POSITION TITLE: Sr. Manager, Product Operations (contract)

REPORTS TO: VP, Product Strategy & Innovation

OFFICE: Remote

Travel: 25% 

DURATION: 6-Month Contract (40 hours per week)

WHO WE’RE LOOKING FOR

Per Scholas is seeking a Senior Manager, Product Operations (Contractor) to strengthen operational rigor and execution reliability across the Product Services department. This role establishes the operating systems that enable curriculum products to move from intake through planning, delivery, launch readiness, and performance reporting with consistency and accountability.

The Senior Manager, Product Operations (Contractor) owns portfolio execution operations during the engagement, including intake workflows, sprint and milestone cadences, dependency and risk management, launch readiness standards, documentation and decision-trail governance, and KPI (Key Performance Indicator) reporting infrastructure. The role partners closely with Product Management, Training Delivery, Revenue, and Research & Evaluation (R&E) to ensure shared visibility and disciplined follow-through.

This role does not own product strategy, curriculum direction, evaluation methodology or analysis, or direct people management. It enables operational excellence so Product Managers can focus on roadmap and content decisions and Learner Evaluations can focus on study design, analysis, and learning impact.

Final prioritization and tradeoff decisions sit with the VP, Strategy & Design. The contractor is expected to surface options, impacts, and recommendations to support timely decisions.

This engagement will transition ownership of the operating cadence, tooling governance, and reporting workflows to the full-time Senior Manager, Product Operations at the end of the contract term.

WHAT YOU’LL DO
Operating Rhythm, Planning, and Portfolio Execution
○ Lead the department’s operating cadence, including bi-weekly sprint planning, weekly execution reviews, monthly portfolio reviews, and quarterly planning support, with clear inputs, outputs, owners, and follow-through.
○ Convert portfolio priorities into executable plans, including milestones, critical paths, dependencies, and delivery checklists that support on-time, high-quality releases.
○ Maintain risk, dependency, and blocker logs; drive resolution by facilitating decision-making and escalating issues with clear options, impacts, and recommendations.
○ Provide capacity and resourcing visibility (load, throughput, constraints) in partnership with Product Management leadership to support transparent tradeoffs and protect delivery commitments.
○ Identify operational gaps and implement process improvements that reduce friction, improve cycle time, and increase delivery predictability across Product Services.

Intake, Workflow Systems, and Tooling Governance
○ Own end-to-end intake operations, including request capture, triage, routing, prioritization support, stakeholder communications, and status transparency.
○ Administer and continuously improve Product Services systems of record: Asana and Smartsheet for projects; Airtable for the product catalog. Establish clear rules for where work is tracked and reported.
○ Establish and maintain SOPs (Standard Operating Procedures) and templates for planning, execution, launches, reporting, and documentation, including version control and decision-trail requirements.
○ Own standardization, documentation, and lifecycle management of Product Services course collateral for internal and external use, ensuring materials are current, version-controlled, and easily retrievable.
○ Design and maintain lightweight automations that improve communication and status visibility across departments (e.g., intake acknowledgements, milestone alerts, dashboard refresh routines).

Launch Readiness and Change Control
○ Lead cross-functional launch readiness for new and refreshed products, ensuring readiness checklists, enablement needs, communications, and operational handoffs are complete prior to release.
○ Implement change control practices to document scope changes, decision rationale, and downstream impacts; ensure release notes and stakeholder communications are timely and consistent.
○ Ensure launch artifacts meet defined standards (runbooks, enablement materials, system readiness confirmations) before releases proceed.

KPI Operations, Reporting, and Accountability
○ Operationalize KPI measurement in partnership with Product and R&E by maintaining KPI definitions, data sources, owners, refresh cadences, and data quality checks.
○ Produce executive-ready reporting on a consistent cadence, including monthly performance packets and dashboard updates, with clear status, context, and action plans (owner and due date).
○ Monitor and report execution health signals (throughput, cycle time, backlog aging, milestone variance) and drive corrective actions when performance trends decline.

Team Collaboration and Innovation (10%):
○ Manage the operational execution of pilots and learning experiments, including timelines, instrumentation requirements, data capture readiness, and readout coordination.
○ Ensure evaluation work is operationally supported while R&E retains ownership of methodology, analysis, and findings.

ACCOUNTABILITY & SUCCESS MEASURES
○ A 30-day baseline assessment will establish current-state performance and improvement targets for the remainder of the engagement.
○ Intake responsiveness: consistent triage turnaround and stakeholder updates; clear queue health and aging visibility.
○ Portfolio hygiene: roadmap initiatives and work items consistently include owner, status, dates, dependencies, and risks.
○ Milestone predictability: improved on-time delivery with documented variance drivers and corrective actions.
○ Launch readiness compliance: launch checklists completed prior to release; handoffs executed consistently.
○ Reporting reliability: monthly packets and dashboards delivered on time with defined completeness and action registers.
○ Decision-log discipline: major scope and priority changes documented promptly with rationale and downstream impacts.
○ Tool adoption and data quality: consistent use of the system of record; reduced duplicate tracking and manual follow-ups.
○ Collateral and catalog integrity: active products have current, version-controlled collateral and accurate product records (status, owner, links to artifacts).
○ Automation impact: measurable reduction in manual follow-ups and coordination overhead through maintained workflow automations.

WHAT YOU’LL BRING TO US
Required Skill Sets
● 6+ years of experience in product operations, program management, portfolio operations, or delivery operations in a cross-functional environment.
● Demonstrated success designing and running operating cadences, including dependency and risk management and executive-ready reporting.
● Strong fluency with work management and reporting tools, including Asana (or equivalent), Smartsheet (or equivalent), Airtable (or equivalent), Google Workspace, and dashboard workflows.
● Experience operationalizing performance measurement, including data definitions, refresh cadences, data quality checks, and recurring reporting routines.
● Bachelor’s degree required; advanced degree is a plus.

Core Skill Sets
● Systems leadership: design repeatable workflows that scale across multiple products and stakeholders.
● Execution discipline: structure ambiguous work into plans, milestones, and measurable outputs.
● Stakeholder leadership: drive alignment, clarify decision rights, and secure closure on priorities and dependencies.
● Data rigor: maintain reliable operational metrics and translate performance signals into action.
● Communication excellence: produce concise, decision-ready updates and maintain clear documentation.

Preferred Skill Sets
● Experience implementing workflow governance and SOPs across complex stakeholder environments.
● Experience building lightweight automations that reduce manual coordination and improve visibility.
● Experience in nonprofit, workforce development, education, or adjacent mission-driven environments.

Professional Qualifications
● Bachelor's degree or equivalent practical industry experience.
● Excellent written communication and organizational skills with the ability to follow through on small details.
● Strong evaluation support and data management skills (operations, readiness, instrumentation), with analysis owned by R&E.

Personal Characteristics
● Results-oriented and pragmatic, with a bias toward clarity and follow-through.
● High ownership and initiative; identifies gaps, builds systems, and sustains operating rhythms.
● Comfortable operating across multiple teams and business lines, balancing urgency with disciplined process.

Compensation 

For this role specifically, we are targeting an hourly rate of $36.06 where the difference in salary is typically determined by several factors, including geography in which the selected candidate resides, and alignment with qualifications and experience.

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