Manager, Technical Program Management

Who You Are:

You are an experienced technical manager who takes pride in building high-performing, resilient teams. You set a high bar and empower your team to meet it by building on individual strengths and supporting execution with clarity and empathy. You enjoy being hands-on, finding energy in directly contributing and driving key projects alongside your team.

Fast-paced, ambiguous environments don't intimidate you; they motivate you. You're a steady hand in dynamic situations and are trusted to bring focus when things are unclear. Your adaptability allows you to flex to the needs of different types of teams and contexts, whether they are research-driven, engineering-driven, or external partnerships.

Who We Are:

You'll be joining the program management team within our Strategic Infrastructure (SI) group, responsible for driving the definition and execution of AI2's ambitious flagship projects, including "truly open" foundation models, AI agents for science, and AI-for-environment initiatives. Our centralized team works directly with world-class researchers to connect the dots between R&D, engineering, and real-world impact. We are deeply involved in technical details while also serving as stewards of the institute's big-picture strategy. Our work spans all levels of the organization-from coordinating with the team operating our state-of-the-art GPU cluster to collaborating directly with executives to drive clarity, decision-making, and prioritization.

Your Next Challenge:

In this role, you will lead technical program management for AI2's Horizontals teams - centralized groups that support critical functions across our entire research and product portfolio. These include compute infrastructure, data annotation, release management, strategic partnerships, model inference, and external user interfaces.

Horizontals exist to break down silos, elevate best practices, and accelerate progress across all programs. The TPMs on this team collaborate across a diverse cross-functional stakeholder group - comms, design, research, and engineering - and contribute to every major initiative at AI2. In this pivotal, high-interaction role, they need exceptional management to support them.

As the leader for this area, you'll develop a strategic view of how projects across the organization connect, and use that insight to identify opportunities for shared investment and efficiency. You'll work with your team to shape approaches and break down goals into actionable work, moving the TPM function from tactical support toward proactive, visionary execution.

The essential functions include, but are not limited to the following:

• Manage and support a growing team of TPMs, helping them thrive in a fast-paced environment with shifting priorities.
• Define high-level strategy and translate it into clear, actionable assignments for your team.
• Create a collaborative, energized, and adaptable team culture that holds a high bar for quality.
• Hire, mentor, and retain high-performing TPMs. Provide coaching and career development that enables long-term success.
• Act as a player-coach, stepping in to own projects directly as needed based on team capacity and your individual strengths.
• Ensure transparent communication with leadership and other stakeholders, including progress updates, risks, and mitigation strategies.
• Lead cross-functional planning and alignment with partners across design, communications, ML platform engineering, full-stack engineering, and research.
• Understand the broader context of each initiative to identify risks, surface opportunities, and drive strategic course corrections when needed.

What You'll Need:

• 8+ years of experience in product or program management.
• 2+ years of management experience in highly cross-functional settings managing at least one direct report.
• Proven experience hiring and recruiting for high-performing teams.
• Strong relationship-building and stakeholder management skills.
• Excellent verbal and written communication, with the ability to tailor messaging across technical, non-technical, and executive audience.
• A strong sense of accountability and a track record of owning outcomes.
• Experience working with a range of engineering teams and familiarity with agile development practices.
• BS degree in Computer Science, Data Science, Statistics, Engineering, Applied Mathematics, or equivalent professional experience.

Bonus qualifications

• Experience in a start up environment
• 2+ year experience with modern AI/ML technologies

Physical Demands and Work Environment:

The physical demands described here are representative of those that must be met by a team member to successfully perform the essential functions of this position. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the functions.

• Must be able to remain in a stationary position for long periods of time.
• The ability to communicate information and ideas so others will understand. Must be able to exchange accurate information in these situations.
• The ability to observe details at close range.
• Can work under deadlines.

A Little More About Ai2:

Ai2 is a Seattle based non-profit AI research institute founded in 2014 by the late Paul Allen. Our mission is building breakthrough AI to solve the world's biggest problems. We develop foundational AI research and innovation to deliver real-world impact through large-scale open models, data, robotics, conservation, and beyond.

In addition to Ai2's core mission, we also aim to contribute to humanity through our treatment of each member of the Ai2 Team. Some highlights are:

• We are a learning organization - because everything Ai2 does is ground-breaking, we are learning every day. Similarly, through weekly Ai2 Academy lectures, a wide variety of world-class AI experts as guest speakers, and our commitment to your personal on-going education, Ai2 is a place where you will have opportunities to continue learning alongside your coworkers.
• We value diversity - We seek to hire, support, and promote people from all genders, ethnicities, and all levels of experience regardless of age. We particularly encourage applications from women, non-binary individuals, people of color, members of the LGBTQA+ community, and people with disabilities of any kind.
• We value inclusion - We understand the value that people's individual experiences and perspectives can bring to an organization, and we are building a culture in which all voices are heard, respected and considered.
• We emphasize a healthy work/life balance - we believe our team members are happiest and most productive when their work/life balance is optimized. While we value powerful research results which drive our mission forward, we also value dinner with family, weekend time, and vacation time. We offer generous paid vacation and sick leave as well as family leave.
• We are collaborative and transparent - we consider ourselves a team, all moving with a common purpose. We are quick to cheer our successes, and even quicker to share and jointly problem solve our failures.
• We are in Seattle - and our office is on the water! We have mountains, we have lakes, we have four seasons, we bike to work, we have a vibrant theater scene, and we have so much else. We even have kayaks for you to paddle right outside our front door. We welcome interest from applicants from outside of the United States.
• We are friendly- chances are you will like every one of the 200+ (and growing) people who work here. We do.

Ai2 is proud to be an Equal Opportunity employer. We do not discriminate based upon race, religion, color, national origin, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions), sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, gender expression, transgender status, sexual stereotypes, age, status as a protected veteran, status as an individual with a disability, or other applicable legally protected characteristics. You may view the related Know Your Rights compliance poster and the Pay Transparency Nondiscrimination Provision by clicking on their corresponding links.

This employer participates in E-Verify and will provide the federal government with your Form I-9 information to confirm that you are authorized to work in the U.S. If E-Verify cannot confirm that you are authorized to work, this employer is required to give you written instructions and an opportunity to contact the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) or Social Security Administration (SSA) so you can begin to resolve the issue before the employer can take any action against you, including terminating your employment. Employers can only use E-Verify once you have accepted a job offer and completed the Form I-9.

We are committed to providing reasonable accommodations to employees and applicants with disabilities to the full extent required by the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). If you feel you need a reasonable accommodation pursuant to the ADA, you are encouraged to contact us at recruiting@allenai.org

Benefits:

• Team members and their families are covered by medical, dental, vision, basic life insurance, basic accidental death and dismemberment insurance, short-term disability, long-term disability, and an employee assistance program.
• Team members are able to enroll in our voluntary life insurance program, our voluntary accidental death and dismemberment program, our health savings account plan, our healthcare reimbursement arrangement plan, and our health care and dependent care flexible spending account plans.
• Team members are able to enroll in our company's 401k plan.
• Team members will receive $125 per month to assist with commuting or internet expenses and will also receive $200 per month for fitness and wellbeing expenses.
• Team members will also receive up to ten sick days per year, up to seven personal days per year, up to 20 vacation days per year and twelve paid holidays throughout the calendar year.
• Team members will be able to receive annual bonuses and can participate in the long-term incentive plan.

Note: This job description in no way states or implies that these are the only duties to be performed by the team members(s) of this position. Team members will be required to follow any other job-related instructions and to perform any other job-related duties requested by any person authorized to give instructions or assignments. All duties and responsibilities are essential functions and requirements and are subject to possible modification to reasonably accommodate individuals with disabilities. To perform this job successfully, the team member(s) will possess the skills, aptitudes, and abilities to perform each duty proficiently. Some requirements may exclude individuals who pose a direct threat or significant risk to the health or safety of themselves or others. The requirements listed in this document are the minimum levels of knowledge, skills, or abilities. This document does not create an employment contract, implied or otherwise, other than an at will relationship.