Strategic Technical Program Manager

About CoLab

At CoLab, we help mechanical engineering teams bring life-changing products to market years sooner.

CoLab is the AI platform for driving stronger engineering decisions. Every design review in CoLab builds a knowledge repository of design feedback, decisions, and lessons learned - which AI agents draw from to flag issues on future designs before they compound. The more your team works in CoLab, the smarter it gets and the faster you arrive at the ideal design. Companies like Ford, Komatsu, and Johnson Controls use CoLab to catch issues earlier, eliminate rework cycles, and bring products to market faster.

Founded in St. John’s, Newfoundland, CoLab has grown quickly from our first customer in 2019 to a rapidly scaling company. We’ve recently been recognized on Deloitte’s Fast 50™ and Fast 500™, and named a Canadian company to watch by The Globe and Mail and Financial Post. 

About the Role

CoLab’s Product team is looking for a Technical Program Manager (TPM) to lead the successful execution of complex R&D deliverables for our largest enterprise customers. This role will report directly into the Director of Technical Program Management, with strong cross-functional partnership with Customer Success and Product to ensure a best-in-class customer experience. While accountable for product delivery outcomes, the TPM will be core member of the customer account team and play a key role in driving trust, transparency, and long term success with CoLab.

You’ll serve as the primary point person for contractual product deliverables, coordinating across Engineering, Product, and the Success team and overseeing the full delivery cycle from scoping to execution. This customer-facing role requires clear communication and executive presence when engaging with both internal and customer stakeholders. 

You’ll ensure that product managers, customer success managers, engineers, and CoLab leadership are aligned on what’s being delivered, by when, and how it connects back to customer outcomes. You’ll lead program planning, manage delivery milestones, track execution, and surface risk early, navigating competing priorities and negotiating deliverables, timelines, and scope with senior stakeholders on both sides. A strong understanding of agile software development is essential.

In the first 6–12 months, success looks like:

• Establishing a scalable model for managing customer product deliverables
• Leading multiple enterprise programs end-to-end without needing executive triage
• Building trust with Product Managers and Engineers while driving accountability to contractual outcomes
• Establishing a regular cadence of crisp, status-oriented project updates that build confidence with customers
• Making it easy for leadership to see program health, risks, and resource alignment across teams

Our Ideal Candidate

You’ve managed complex technical programs in a B2B SaaS or enterprise software setting, with extensive outward customer communication. You think in systems and edge cases, but communicate with clarity. You’re familiar with agile software development and comfortable speaking the language of engineers and product managers. You’re energized by getting things organized, but don’t get stuck in process for process’ sake.

You’re a proactive communicator who makes it easy for others to know what’s happening and where they need to plug in, particularly with cross-functional stakeholders. You’re adept at mining for conflict, a strong negotiator, and identify and resolve issues before they escalate. You’re comfortable leading scoping conversations, user testing workflows, and feedback cycles, and you thrive on closing the loop between customer expectation and product delivery. 

This role won’t be a fit if you shy away from ambiguity, hesitate to push back when priorities collide, or wait to be told what to do.

Job Responsibilities

• Own end-to-end internal coordination of customer product deliverables across Product, Engineering, and Success, surfacing blockers and risk early
• Collaborate with Product Managers to ensure deliverables are fully scoped, resourced, and sequenced within the roadmap
• Partner with CSMs to align internal delivery timelines with customer expectations, identifying risks and dependencies to proactively problem solve
• Lead and operationalize the user acceptance testing (UAT) process, coordinating customer participation, success criteria, and timelines
• Collect, synthesize, and communicate post-delivery feedback to drive improvement and inform future roadmap decisions
• Define and track success metrics that align delivery milestones with customer value realization (ex: activation, first value, adoption)
• Build and manage tools and processes to track program scope, delivery status, risk, and decision history
• Create and own customer-facing communications including executive reviews around program updates, status, and scope changes to ensure messaging, tone, and cadence meet enterprise expectations

Qualifications

Must-Haves:

• 5+ years of experience in program management or customer-facing project/program roles in SaaS
• Proven ability to lead complex, multi-stakeholder programs across technical and customer teams
• Strong understanding of agile software development processes (e.g., sprint planning, backlog grooming, delivery rhythms)
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills; able to write crisp updates and facilitate tough conversations
• Highly organized, proactive, and outcomes-driven—you know how to bring structure to chaos

Bonus Points:

• Experience working with Fortune 1000 or large enterprise customers
• Familiarity with B2B SaaS workflows, especially in the engineering or manufacturing tech space

Extra Details

• Compensation: This is a full-time, permanent position with an attractive compensation package that includes stock options.
• Benefits: This role offers an extended health and benefits package that includes unlimited paid vacation and RRSP or 401K  matching
• Remote/Hybrid Work: This role has the flexibility to work from anywhere within North America, with preference given to candidates located in Pacific Standard Time (PST)

Frequently cited statistics show that people who identify with historically marginalized groups are likely to apply to jobs only if they meet 100% of the qualifications. We encourage you to help us break that statistic and apply even if you don’t meet every single qualification—your potential is what matters most to us.