[Hiring] Staff/Principal Technical Product Manager @Skylight

Role Description

At Skylight, product managers are responsible for strategy, planning, execution, stakeholder management, and team health. Product managers partner with researchers, designers, engineers, client stakeholders, and others to inform their product decisions. At a high level, it’s the product manager’s job to figure out what to build next and why.

A technical product manager specializes in products with significant technical depth — platforms, APIs, data systems, or modernization efforts — where product decisions depend on fluency with the underlying architecture and engineering tradeoffs.

In this role, you’ll lead technically complex products across our federal health and civilian portfolio — the platforms, data systems, and modernization efforts behind services that millions of people rely on to access care, benefits, and other essential programs. You’ll work at the point where product strategy meets real engineering tradeoffs, helping cross-functional teams turn complex, often legacy-bound systems into services that work for the people who depend on them.

What you’ll do

• Lead a cross-functional team of researchers, designers, and engineers to build and ship technically complex, high-impact products and services.
• Translate user needs, policy requirements, and engineering realities into a product strategy — vision, measures of success, roadmap, and a prioritized backlog.
• Make product decisions that hinge on fluency with the underlying architecture, APIs, and data systems, weighing engineering tradeoffs alongside user and business value.
• Manage direction, scope, and priorities from user research through minimum viable product to scalable, sustainable solutions.
• Draw on data and feedback to continually sharpen the product strategy and roadmap.
• Partner closely with government teams to transfer product and technical knowledge, and creatively navigate bureaucratic constraints to clear the path for delivery.

Qualifications

• Understand lean product principles and how to apply them (e.g., minimum viable product) at various stages of the product life cycle in order to mitigate risk, validate assumptions, and amplify learning.
• Can develop a product strategy that is informed by an understanding of the problem to be solved, prioritizes outcomes over feature sets, and establishes the direction of the product over time (e.g., product roadmap), including success criteria.
• Ability to execute the product strategy by breaking down the product’s scope into usable chunks of value that can be realized sooner rather than later, creating and maintaining a prioritized backlog with validated user stories, and facilitating team ceremonies over the course of the product’s iterations.
• Hands-on technical background, such as prior experience as a software engineer, engineering manager, data engineer, or architect, with the ability to evaluate technical trade-offs and engage in architecture and API discussions.
• Understand how to engage in the process of human-centered design in order to better inform product direction.
• Ability to collaborate with folks outside of your discipline, such as researchers, designers, engineers, and others, in order to get things done.
• Ability to manage clients and stakeholders in a way that builds trust, alignment, and healthy environments for individuals and teams.
• Understand the merits of different software development methodologies (e.g., agile, lean) and how to put them into practice.
• Translating fluently between technical and non-technical stakeholders.
• Experience working on cross-functional teams (product, design, engineering, ops) in iterative delivery.
• A mindset and work approach that aligns with our core values.

Nice-to-haves

• Familiarity with the technical side of modernization work — APIs, cloud platforms, data systems, or migrating off aging legacy systems.
• Experience with health, benefits, or other high-stakes, public-facing government services.
• Experience delivering technology in government, regulated industries, or other public-benefit settings.
• A track record of staying aligned and accountable on remote teams.

Other requirements

• Some of our available roles are on federal contracts that require a degree or additional years of experience as a substitute.
• All work must be conducted within the U.S., excluding U.S. territories.
• You must be legally authorized to work in the U.S. now and in the future without sponsorship.
• As a government contractor, you may be required to obtain a public trust or security clearance.
• You must complete a company background check successfully.

Logistics

• Position type: This is a full-time, exempt position.
• Location: This is a fully remote position.
• Travel: This role may require occasional or regular travel based on company, client, or contract needs.

Care package

• Medical insurance, dental insurance, vision insurance.
• Short-term and long-term disability insurance.
• Life and AD&D insurance.
• Dependent care FSA, healthcare FSA, health savings account.
• Dollar-for-dollar 401(k) match up to 10% of your salary with no vesting period.
• Flexible paid-time-off policy (generally around 25 days per year), plus 11 paid federal holidays.
• Up to 12 weeks paid-time-off for all eligible new birth, adoption, or foster parents.
• Performance rewards, including annual salary increase, annual performance bonus, spot bonuses, and stock options.
• Business development / sales bonuses.
• Referral bonuses.
• Annual $2000 allowance for professional development.
• Annual $750 allowance for tech-related purchases.
• Annual swag budget of $100 to display your Skylight pride with some merchandise (hoodies, hats, and more).
• Dollar-for-dollar charity donation matching, up to $500 per year.
• Flexible, remote-friendly work environment.
• An environment that empowers you to unleash your superpowers for public good.