Senior Product Manager, Digital Platform
Reading Partners is changing the education landscape. We are a leader in working to solve the literacy crisis in our country by leveraging community volunteers in under-resourced schools. Our diverse and expansive volunteer base provides one-on-one tutoring to students twice weekly, and our program is proven to help children master the reading fundamentals they need to unlock their potential as successful, happy, and confident readers in school and in life. Our people are our heartbeat and our greatest resource; we are all passionately rallied around our mission to help children become lifelong learners by empowering communities to provide individualized instruction that works. Join our stellar team leading the charge to deepen our impact and expand our service. Watch this video to learn more about Reading Partners.
The high level:
It is an exciting time to join Reading Partners as our organization is making greater investments in digital learning and educational technology to support our strategic plan focused on increasing educational equity for thousands more students across the country.
As a Senior Product Manager, you will collaborate with our partners’ software engineers and solutions architects while working closely as part of a cross-functional team of staff from IT, program, community engagement, data & evaluation, and regional operations to improve the user experience, security, and systems integration of our digital learning platform, Reading Partners Connects (RPCx). While planning and managing 3rd party systems integrations, you will focus on the ongoing development of the synchronous learning platform using clear methodologies, project management tools, and up-to-date software development practices while enhancing the organization’s capacity for digital learning and product innovation.
What you’ll do:
Continually develop the Reading Partners Connects (RPCx) platform roadmap to meet strategic and operational goals
- Work with the Chief Impact Officer to understand regional leaders’ business development goals and external partners’ needs, analyze proposed requirements, and evaluate implementation potential and challenges.
- Create a platform strategy and roadmap, and develop a communications strategy supporting platform goals. Align the roadmap with other critical business processes (e.g., Reading Partners AmeriCorps Orientation).
- Ensure equity is built into design and production processes by using resources from such organizations as the EdTech Equity Project, EdSafe Alliance, and Digital Promise.
- Develop functional specifications and maintain internal documentation for decisions, processes, and features.
Manage the development and execution of new features and updated functionality in a timely and cost-efficient manner.
- Coordinate with our external platform development team on executing the roadmap and with internal teams on training for AmeriCorps members, staff, and external partnerships.
- Use UI/UX design principles and author user stories to ensure clarity of purpose and design with external platform developers.
- Maintain weekly meetings and bi-directional communications with Reading Partners’ current platform development partner and internal team members.
- Establish and maintain collaborative working relationships with program, community engagement, IT, data & evaluation, and regional operations teams to improve and sustain the product in the long term.
- Conduct user feedback analyses to inform platform requirements and enhancements.
- Maintain and prioritize the backlog of bug fixes, new features, and enhancements.
- Collect user satisfaction data to manage cross-team workaround bug fixes, and enhancements, to ensure high satisfaction levels among end-users.
- Collaborate with the development/fundraising and marketing and communications teams on creating materials to position new enhancements and features.
Collaborate with leaders on product strategy and internal capacity
- With Chief Knowledge Officer and Chief Impact Officer, bring the leadership team and other stakeholders together around a common product vision and strategy
- Ensure platform development is not constrained and allows for more widespread use among potential partners and a strong brand in markets using the platform
- Develop and implement communications strategies to build and sustain wide product use
- Work with Chief Knowledge Officer and IT team to ensure RP has the right cross-functional capacities to build and continue iterating on the platform into the future
Other duties as needed.
How you’ll do it:
Educational Technology Expertise:
- Use your product development and/or management experience with web-based platforms, products, apps, or services to apply industry best practices in the development and execution of an enhanced online tutoring platform. Use iterative development methodologies, user-centered design, planning tools, and/or continuous delivery methodologies to enhance the platform and user experience. Author product requirements, use cases, and user stories and translate technical information into clear requirements and processes to ensure new or enhanced features improve the platform.
Collaboration & Partnerships:
- Positively collaborate with and lead partnerships with key vendors to meet and exceed platform goals. Clarify the related roles and responsibilities and needs of internal and external stakeholders. Integrate ideas and needs of others in developing feasible strategies to achieve goals. Collaborate with leadership team members to understand goals and platform needs, collect user feedback and satisfaction data, and set priorities to refine the vision for the platform and its features to meet updated requirements.
Project Management:
- Demonstrate exceptional skill at ensuring product goals, project purposes, and criteria for success are clearly defined. Use your experience launching edtech products or platforms and proven project management abilities to set deliverables and milestones and track each phase of the project. Manage multiple competing priorities using clear project management methods, and re-prioritize as needed. Have astute attention to detail and collect regular user and management feedback to improve the platform. Document key decisions, processes, and features. Remain adaptable, flexible, and solutions-driven while navigating complex problems. Anticipate challenges and/or questions and proactively act to address them.
Relationship Development & Communication:
- Model highly effective communication practices that ultimately lead to achieving results through others. Quickly garner influence and build deep, trusting relationships with internal leaders and external partners. Develop and/or refine systems for communication, tailor communications to audiences, and contextualize messaging for each person or conversation. Demonstrate an ability to communicate effectively in all modalities and settings ranging from internal meetings to phone calls to videoconferences to training sessions. Effectively convey needs, progress, outcomes, and next steps with vendors and internal leaders.
Flexibility & Ambiguity:
- Display comfort with ambiguity while having a strong bias for structure. Be comfortable working in a space of unknown answers to establish what is possible for new opportunities. Employ flexibility, resiliency, and perseverance when faced with obstacles and competing deadlines with limited resources. Show quick, sound decision-making ability. Demonstrate a strong ability to recognize problems, solve them quickly, and appropriately message all shifts. Consider options that take into account all stakeholders, recommend actions, and make decisions accordingly.
About you!
You’ll be successful in this role if you:
- have a bachelor’s degree or equivalent combination of education and experience
- have 3-5 years of product development and/or management experience with web-based platforms, products, apps, or services
- have experience with turning product requirements, use cases, and user stories into new or enhanced features and functions for platforms/products
- have experience managing vendor relationships and internal teams, leading to successful product launches and/or increased user adoption and engagement
- have strong written and oral communication skills
- have excellent computer skills, including Google applications and database management
- are committed to improving education equity and access
- boast a deep belief in our mission
- root your work in our core values and educational equity
- can prove eligibility to work legally in the U.S.
- COVID-19 vaccination is required unless a medical or religious accommodation is requested and approved. Please review our Vaccination Policy.
Bonus Points if you:
- have experience with Agile development methodologies
- have experience with Salesforce or other relational databases
- have experience using R code for data management and/or analysis
- have SQL programming experience and familiarity working with or developing data models
- are an AmeriCorps, Peace Corps, or other national service alum/alumna
What we offer:
Reading Partners offers the full package – great benefits, a great place to work and the opportunity to have a glowing and growing career.
- We offer a competitive salary commensurate with experience. This is a full-time, exempt, salaried at $120,524.00
- We offer a comprehensive benefits package, including medical, dental, vision, disability, life insurance, flex spending accounts, generous paid time off, commuter benefits, referral bonuses, 403(b) option, and Employee Assistance Program (EAP).
- We offer an exciting and dynamic culture, and we commit to investing in and supporting our amazing people to grow their careers with us. As such, we provide ongoing professional development opportunities, including an annual staff retreat in Oakland, CA.
The other things you need to know:
- Travel: This position may travel a couple of times a year to Reading Partners’ regions. If not based in CA, this position may also involve occasional travel to Reading Partners’ National Headquarters in Oakland, CA.
- Typical Physical & Mental Demands: Requires prolonged sitting with some bending, stooping and stretching, and eye-hand coordination and manual dexterity sufficient to operate a keyboard, telephone, photocopier, calculator, and other office equipment. Requires normal range of hearing and eyesight to communicate with volunteers and staff. Also requires flexibility to readily adapt to a changing environment.
What’s Next?
If you’re interested in joining our Reading Partners team, please submit the following application materials to our online job posting:
- A cover letter describing your interest in Reading Partners and how your past experience has prepared you for this role. Please include your salary expectations.
- Resume
Reading Partners is an Equal Opportunity Employer, with a strong commitment to diversity in the workplace. Applications will be considered on a rolling basis. Position will remain posted until filled. No phone inquiries, please.
At Reading Partners we respect and honor the diversity in our workforce, and we are an Equal Opportunity Employer.