Director of Product

Packback’s mission is to empower every student to be fearlessly curious and find their unique voice.

These few words shape everything we do at Packback from the smallest decision to the largest. Over the last decade since our company’s founding, our team has seen first-hand the power of giving students intentionally designed spaces in their learning experience to be autonomous and curious. We have also seen the incredible benefits of using AI technology to shorten feedback loops and help students revise their work before they submit.

Packback is a pedagogy partner that uses technology as a “means to an end” to shorten feedback loops for students and instructors, improve writing and critical thinking skills, and cultivate student-centered, trust-based educational learning environments.

Who we are

Packback team members are passionate, mission-driven lifelong learners. Many of us spent time as educators in classrooms and have experienced first hand just how draining the day to day of educating can be. We have seen the gap between the most and least prepared students grow wider every year. The pressure to close that gap has once rested directly on our shoulders, and we understand the enormous cost of addressing that gap, and also not addressing that gap.

Some of us were intrinsically motivated students, the “teacher’s pets” who never want to stop learning. Some of us were the distracted or unmotivated students who wished their instructors would have adopted the pedagogy behind Packback. But all of us share a passionate commitment to our purpose.

About The Role

Packback is seeking a Director of Product to support our mission to help every student follow their curiosity and discover their unique voice.

Packback’s A.I.-powered platform is used by educators in both K-12 and higher education to help their students fall in love with the subject matter, drive personalized learning, and improve student critical thinking and writing skills through real-time AI feedback.

The Director of Product Design will report directly to the Chief Product Officer and will be responsible for overseeing the execution of our product roadmap, helping your team develop the best solutions to every problem, and measuring the success of those solutions.

The Director of Product Design will manage the successful delivery of the annual product roadmap, creating product briefs to onboard product managers and designers to key projects, ensuring that the projects are building the best possible solution to the core project goals and delivering the highest quality user experience, and performing detailed review of project specs and designs.

Most importantly, as our Director of Product Design, you will be responsible for championing our Packback’s Product Design Principles that focus on building a student-centered learning environment, and helping to scale these principles as our team grows.

What You'll Do

• Development of Project briefs based on the company roadmap and goals
• Careful management of roadmap timelines
• Being an excellent and proactive manager of a growing team of Product Managers and UX Designers
• Reviewing project specifications, user experience designs and prototypes, and offering constructive feedback to guide projects to success
• Close monitoring of project timelines and prioritizing as necessary
• Establishing KPIs for each project and monitoring project success
• Researching new market opportunities and reducing uncertainty on projects to help ensure success
• Collaborate closely with product, engineering, and leadership teams to ensure the success of product initiatives (and overall company initiatives)
• Overseeing hiring, training, and team development of our product design and UX functions
  
  

Qualifications

We’re looking for somebody who is independent, self-motivated and eager to grow Packback’s capabilities.

• Demonstrated experience managing the nuances of balancing business needs with user needs to design breakthrough solutions
• 8+ years of experience of experience working in product design, with 3 years directly managing and leading product designers
• Demonstrated experience
• Experience working within a small- to medium-sized product and engineering organization
• Comfort researching open-ended problems to help drive down uncertainty for your teams
• Comfort defining product KPIs and making data-driven design decisions
• Exceptional management communication skills
• A proven track record of leading effective product design teams, with experience successfully leading distributed/remote teams
• Experience building a collaborative, safe, inspiring, and bold team culture which creates the conditions necessary for experimentation and innovation
• Willingness to travel to the office roughly 1-2X per quarter, and occasional travel to visit key client for research.
• While this is a remote position and travel is not a frequent requirement, you will be asked to come to the office approximately 2X quarterly (travel covered) and may travel to visit key clients for research
  
  

Additional Information

• Applicants must be authorized to work for any employer in the U.S without the need for sponsorship. Packback does not offer visa sponsorship for this role.
• Currently we are only able to hire from these states: AL, AR, AZ, CA, CO, CT, FL, GA, HI, IA, IL, IN, KY, MD, MI, NC, NY, OH, PA, RI, SC, TX, VA, WA, WI.
• The salary range for this position is $148,000 - 168,000 annually + bonus
  
  

Why work at Packback?

Build a meaningful career while innovating the future of education as a part of a company culture that fosters the growth, safety, and creativity of its employees.

Intentional Culture

Packback knows that the single most important part of any company is its people. We take building and maintaining a conscious and intentional culture of open communication, curiosity, and leadership extremely seriously. We work hard to make Packback a safe environment where people can focus on doing great work instead of dealing with drama.

Career Development

Packback’s career development tracks present a unique balance between clarity and guidance around defined paths, and room for our team to forge their own path. Each team has its own career development tracks with support and training, and still allow for customization of these paths to create a role where a team member’s full passions and abilities are put to use!

Thoughtful Benefits

• Generous leave policies for welcoming new children or family care
• Multiple Health and Welfare Benefit Options (Medical, Dental, Vision)
• 401k plan (with employer matching)
• Flexible + Remote Work Opportunities
• Unlimited PTO
• Employer Assistance Program (EAP)
• Calm and DoorDash subscriptions