Sr. Portfolio Program Manager - R&D
Leads portfolio governance, planning, dependency management, executive reporting, and delivery improvement across R&D Product and Engineering organizations. Requires 8+ years in technology portfolio or program management, Agile expertise, strong stakeholder influence, and experience applying automation and AI-enabled workflows.
About the job
Responsibilities
- Partner with Product and Engineering leaders to establish and maintain portfolio baselines covering commitments, milestones, dependencies, ownership, readiness expectations, capacity assumptions, and success measures.
- Track portfolio commitments and execution progress; surface material variances and coordinate change-management actions for changes to scope, timelines, resources, or delivery commitments.
- Establish and improve portfolio metrics, dashboards, reporting practices, automation, and AI-enabled workflows.
- Identify, evaluate, and introduce AI, automation, and emerging technologies that improve program management effectiveness, scalability, decision-making, and operational efficiency.
- Improve portfolio data quality, tooling, process standards, reporting, and adoption of portfolio-management practices.
- Track and coordinate cross-team and cross-pillar dependencies, including ownership, impacts, required dates, and status.
- Lead portfolio reviews and facilitate scaled planning, governance, synchronization, quarterly planning, and executive review forums.
- Synthesize portfolio information into executive-ready insights, risks, dependencies, trade-offs, and recommendations; track decisions, escalations, and follow-through through closure.
- Coach Product and Engineering teams on Agile practices, planning discipline, delivery predictability, flow efficiency, and continuous improvement.
- Identify initiatives that may need dedicated strategic program-management support and integrate initiative health, dependencies, change impacts, and readiness into the portfolio view.
Requirements
- 8+ years of experience in Portfolio Management, Program Management, Technical Program Management, Product Operations, or related roles in a SaaS or technology environment.
- Experience leading Product and Engineering portfolios across multiple teams, product areas, or organizational units.
- Experience establishing portfolio governance frameworks, operating rhythms, quarterly planning processes, executive review forums, and reporting mechanisms.
- Demonstrated success managing portfolio risk, dependencies, capacity constraints, competing priorities, and roadmap execution at scale.
- Experience facilitating executive, leadership, and cross-functional governance forums.
- Demonstrated success improving team effectiveness, delivery predictability, planning maturity, flow efficiency, and execution outcomes through Agile coaching and continuous improvement.
- Ability to influence without formal authority, navigate ambiguity, clarify accountability, and drive alignment and follow-through.
- Experience implementing automation, AI-enabled workflows, and emerging technologies.
- Strong analytical, facilitation, communication, and stakeholder-management skills.
- Working knowledge of Productboard, Jira, Confluence, dashboarding, and business intelligence platforms.
- Agile coaching or Agile delivery certification such as ICP-ACC, CSP, CSM, PSM, SAFe SPC, or SAFe Agilist, or equivalent practical experience.
- Bachelor's degree or equivalent practical experience.
Compensation and Benefits
- Health coverage, paid parental leave, paid time off and holidays, quarterly self-care days, and stock options.
- Equipment and support for working from home or in an office.
- Learning and development initiatives, including LinkedIn Learning.
- Wellness education sessions and employee resource group events.
Skills
Portfolio Management, Program Management, Technical Program Management, Product Operations, AI Automation, Productboard, Jira, Confluence, Dashboarding, Business Intelligence, Agile, Scrum, Quarterly Planning, Dependency Management, Risk Management
Similar jobs
Technical Program Management jobs
Origin
Bengaluru, India
Leads cross-functional technical programs spanning autonomy, hardware, and field operations, establishing delivery cadence, dependency management, OKRs, and issue resolution. Requires 8+ years of technical or engineering program management experience with hardware or robotics programs.
GoHighLevel
India
Senior Program Manager leading Commerce release planning and cross-functional programs across Product, Engineering, Customer Success, and go-to-market teams. The role requires 5–7 years of experience, strong analytics and SQL/BI skills, and the ability to improve release predictability, adoption, and retention.
OpenLoop
Remote
Manages concurrent external customer implementations from post-sale handoff through launch and stabilization, including integrated planning, governance, risk management, UAT, and readiness. Requires 5+ years of project or program management experience and fluency across technical implementation dependencies.
GitLab
Bengaluru, India
Leads complex, cross-functional technical programs spanning product, engineering, data, and security, translating strategy into predictable execution and scaled adoption. The role requires senior stakeholder leadership, strong communication, risk management, and experience with SaaS, cloud infrastructure, DevOps, or AI/ML initiatives.
OpenAI
Remote
Leads end-to-end technical delivery of AI deployments for semiconductor customers, coordinating engineering, research, product, and customer teams. The role requires 7+ years of customer-facing technical delivery experience, deep semiconductor workflows expertise, and experience shipping production AI or LLM systems.