[Hiring] Technical Product Manager @Applaudo Studios

Role Description

You are a technically fluent, execution-oriented professional who thrives at the intersection of product, engineering, and stakeholder management. You communicate clearly, operate independently, and bring empathy to every interaction.

You are proactive and solution-oriented. You identify problems, define solutions, and drive them forward in fast-paced Agile environments. You actively leverage AI tools as part of your daily workflow to improve productivity and delivery outcomes.

You feel comfortable owning a product backlog, onboarding API partners, presenting to a Change Advisory Board, and collaborating directly with clients to troubleshoot issues. You connect teams, drive accountability, and ensure initiatives move forward successfully.

Note: This position is offered under a contractor model for a period of 6 months.

Qualifications

• 5+ years of experience as a Product Manager or Technical BA working alongside engineering teams in digital product or software delivery environments.
• Strong fluency in Agile and Scrum, including backlog ownership, sprint ceremonies, user story writing, and acceptance criteria definition.
• Strong product ownership mindset, with the ability to prioritize effectively, champion quality, and drive the Definition of Done.
• Proven ability to act as a liaison between engineering teams, business stakeholders, and external technology partners.
• Excellent technical communication skills, translating business requirements into technical language for audiences at all levels.
• Working knowledge of REST APIs, JSON, and authentication concepts, including error handling, log review, and defect triage.
• Hands-on experience with Jira or Azure DevOps for backlog management, issue tracking, and release coordination.
• Strong documentation skills covering requirements, epics, user stories, workflows, and integration touchpoints.
• Active user of AI tools and copilots, with a practical focus on improving workflows and engineering productivity.
• Highly self-managed, with strong ownership and proactive risk identification across concurrent initiatives.
• Strong empathy and curiosity for customer and partner problems, with a practical and solution-oriented mindset.
• Advanced English proficiency with conversational fluency to collaborate effectively with US-based stakeholders.

Requirements

• Own and maintain a well-groomed product backlog, writing user stories and acceptance criteria aligned with business needs.
• Lead cross-functional project delivery and serve as the team’s single point of accountability for quality and progress.
• Act as the primary coordination point between internal engineering teams and external API or integration partners.
• Translate business and partner requirements into clear functional and technical specifications.
• Manage intake, triage, prioritization, and assignment of technical issues, defects, and enhancement requests.
• Support onboarding of API and integration partners, including requirements gathering, environment setup, testing, and go-live.
• Facilitate Agile ceremonies and cross-functional working sessions with internal and external teams.
• Collaborate with engineering teams to analyze logs, error reports, and support tickets to diagnose and resolve issues.
• Deliver weekly status reports to stakeholders covering milestones, risks, and blockers.
• Present change requests to the Change Advisory Board (CAB).
• Coordinate and support UAT and partner validation activities.
• Track delivery progress, dependencies, and risks across multiple concurrent initiatives.
• Provide direct user support when required, including troubleshooting, feature walkthroughs, and discovery sessions.
• Leverage AI tools to improve workflows, documentation quality, and delivery speed.
• Identify opportunities to improve onboarding, support, and issue management processes through standardization and automation.

Benefits

• Hands-on experience with Jira or Azure DevOps for backlog management and issue tracking.
• Working knowledge of REST APIs, JSON, and integrations; able to support partner onboarding and triage technical issues.
• Proven ability to write user stories, acceptance criteria, and technical documentation.
• Advanced English proficiency with conversational fluency for US-based stakeholder collaboration.