Product Manager, Career Exploration, BigFuture at Los Angeles, California

Product Manager, Career Exploration For BigFuture School

College Board - BigFuture Location: This is a remote role, aligned to core EST hours. Candidates who live near CB offices have the option of being fully remote or hybrid (Tuesday and Wednesday in office). All CB employees are required to occasionally travel to meet in person for business purposes. Role Type: This is a full-time position

About the Team BigFuture reaches over 7 million students each year and is the leading free online resource for College, Scholarship, and Career Exploration. Our BigFuture product team is committed to helping every student own their future. BigFuture consists of three integrated product offerings that serve both students and higher education institutions:

• BigFuture.org provides students and families with tools to explore colleges, discover scholarships, understand how to pay for college, and learn about career pathways. It empowers all students to unlock opportunities that match their aspirations and financial needs.
• BigFuture School is a privacy-forward mobile app that supports students and educators at participating K-12 schools in making critical connections between students' unique strengths and interests and future pathway opportunities. Students can connect with over 1,500 higher education institutions and receive messages tailored to their interests and goals-putting them in the driver's seat of their journey.
• College Enrollment Solutions enable higher education institutions to authentically engage in student relevant recruitment efforts to advance college access. Through tools like Search and Connections, colleges can discover and reach a broad population of students from more than 25,000 high schools nationwide.

Our team collaborates deeply with other cross-functional teams including Community, Technology, Research, College Readiness Assessments, Strategic Higher Education, State & District Partnerships, Legal, and Finance.

About the Opportunity As the Product Manager, Career Exploration for BigFuture School, you bring a strategic, self-directing approach and thrive in ambiguity, with a passion for solving complex problems and driving meaningful outcomes. You will play a central role in one of College Board's highest priority initiatives, connecting learning to opportunity by helping students understand the skills they are developing, how those skills align to their interests, and how to plan for life after high school. This is highly visible, mission-critical work, and you will serve as a critical influencer and collaborator across the organization, partnering closely with programs including College Readiness Assessments, Advanced Placement, and Learning and Assessment to ensure BigFuture serves as a meaningful through line that changes the way students think about relevance in high school and how it translates to their future. You leverage your strong background in product management and educational technology to maintain a strategic roadmap for BigFuture based on market trends, customer needs, and organizational priorities. You are eager to solicit and analyze feedback from a diverse set of stakeholders, including higher ed enrollment leaders, state and district partners, schools, students, and internal College Board teams, turning insights into impactful actions. You collaborate closely with cross-functional scrum teams, lead execution efforts with excellence, and build strong relationships that produce tremendous value for students and the organization. In the face of complexity, you lean in with initiative, demonstrating the leadership and influence needed to deliver results that matter. In this role, you will:

• Planning & Roadmap Development (50%)
• Assist with crafting compelling strategy briefs, business cases, and product roadmaps to justify product investments aligned with BigFuture's divisional goals
• Lead the full product development lifecycle - from ideation and new feature development to enhancements and responsible sunsetting of legacy functionality
• Identify and validate user problems and opportunities through data, user research, and analytics; ensure customer and business needs are integrated into the development process
• Collaborate with cross-functional stakeholders to refine the product roadmap in response to changing customer needs, market trends, and internal priorities
• Clearly communicate product strategy and roadmap across cross-functional teams to maintain alignment and support decision-making
• Partner with cross-functional teams to develop launch strategies, training materials, documentation, and engagement content
• Maintain deep industry and market knowledge while serving as a subject matter expert on BigFuture's platform, vision, and strategy internally and externally
• Execution & Delivery (50%)
• Break down features into user stories with clear acceptance criteria, developed collaboratively with technology, UX, and other stakeholders-while maintaining ownership as the Product Manager
• Partner with technology managers to understand technical constraints and drive product needs through a technical lens
• Maintain a well-groomed backlog of user-centered stories, prioritizing work based on the product roadmap, technical considerations, and strategic objectives
• Drive delivery through active participation in Agile ceremonies - refinement, sprint planning, stand-ups, demos, and retrospectives - fostering continuous improvement and team alignment
• Monitor initiatives closely to identify risks, resolve blockers, and ensure timely delivery of product milestones.
• Coordinate complex technical, legal, and data-related dependencies across multiple teams to support seamless product development execution
• Continuously assess product performance through data and user feedback, ensuring outcomes align with defined goals and drive value

About You To qualify for this role, you must have:

• 5+ years of experience in Product Management, with substantial expertise in education technology, including work across the K-12 and/or Higher Ed sectors
• Experience in career exploration, workforce development, career readiness, or a related domain is strongly preferred; candidates without this background bring genuine curiosity and the humility to build domain knowledge quickly
• A proactive, ownership-first mindset; you don't just relay messages, you take initiative, solve problems, and drive outcomes with purpose and accountability
• Hands-on experience working in an Agile product development environment, collaborating closely with cross-functional teams
• A customer-centric approach combined with strong organizational awareness; you're curious and adaptable with tremendous learning agility
• Strong analytical skills, combining quantitative data and qualitative insights with creative thinking to define problems and craft innovative, effective solutions
• A proven track record of building trusted, productive relationships with internal teams and external stakeholders
• Exceptional verbal and written communication skills, with the ability to tailor messages to diverse audiences
• Experience working with AI in a production environment, with a strong curiosity to learn more
• Mobile app experience is a plus
• The ability to travel 5-7 times a year to College Board offices or on behalf of College Board business

All roles at College Board require:

• A passion for expanding educational and career opportunities and mission-driven work
• Authorization to work in the United States for any employer
• Curiosity and enthusiasm for emerging technologies, with a willingness to experiment with and adopt new AI-driven solutions and comfort learning and applying new digital tools independently and proactively.
• Clear and concise communication skills, written and verbal
• A learner's mindset and a commitment to growth: welcoming diverse perspectives, giving and receiving timely, respectful feedback, and continuously improving through iterative learning and user input
• A drive for impact and excellence: solving complex problems, making data-informed decisions, prioritizing what matters most, and continuously improving through learning, user input, and external benchmarking
• A collaborative and empathetic approach: working across differences, fostering trust, and contributing to a culture of shared success

About Our Process

• Application review will begin immediately and will continue until the position is filled. This role is expected to accept applications for a minimum of 5 business days.
• While the hiring process may vary, it generally includes: resume and application submission, recruiter phone/video screen, hiring manager interview, performance exercise such as live coding, panel interview, a conversation with leadership and reference checks.

What We Offer At College Board, we offer more than just a paycheck-we provide a meaningful career, a supportive team, and a comprehensive package designed to help you thrive. We're a self-sustaining nonprofit that believes in fair and competitive compensation, grounded in your qualifications, experience, impact, and the market. A Thoughtful Approach to Compensation

• The hiring range for this role is $80,000 - $157,000.
• Your exact salary will depend on your location, experience, and how your background compares to others in similar roles at College Board.
• We aim to make our best offer upfront-rooted in fairness, transparency, and market data.
• We adjust salaries by location to ensure fairness, no matter where you live.