Sr. Manager, Product Operations (contract)

Per Scholas is a nonprofit organization focused on unlocking the potential of individuals through technology training. They are seeking a Senior Manager, Product Operations to strengthen operational rigor and execution reliability across the Product Services department, ensuring effective management of curriculum products from planning to performance reporting.

Responsibilities:

• 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
• 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)
• 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
• 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
• 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

Requirements:

• 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
• 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
• 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
• 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