Product Manager - Software and AI

Job Description

Job Description

Read this part first

If your idea of a great day is updating a project board and chasing people for status, close this tab. We'll both be happier.

If your idea of a great day is sitting across from a CEO, pulling apart how their business actually works, spotting the three workflows that are quietly bleeding them out, and sketching what to build instead… keep reading… This role was written for you.

What RAD is building

RAD builds the software, automation, AI tools, and internal systems that make businesses run better. We get close enough to a company to see where things are breaking, where people are wasting time, and where better systems create real leverage — then we build those systems.

We live in the real AI world, not the hype world. We care about use cases that hold up on a Tuesday afternoon, not flashy demos. Zero interest in AI theater.

We call our model Automation Department as a Service because it's honest about how we work: embedded with the client, thinking strategically, driving both the ideas and the execution. Less "vendor on a call." More "the team they can't imagine operating without."

This role is one of the most important seats in that model.

The role in one paragraph

You'll be one of the primary faces of RAD to our clients. You'll sit with founders, CEOs, and operators, understand their businesses at a systems level, and turn messy operational reality into sharp, buildable plans. You'll lead delivery on high-value accounts, but more importantly you'll shape the work itself - deciding what gets built, why it matters, how it should behave, and what success actually looks like. You don't need to write code. You do need to think like a product person, operate like a strategist, and execute like someone who's allergic to ambiguity.

Part client strategist. Part product designer. Part delivery lead. Part operator. All four, on the same day, often in the same meeting.

What you'll actually do

• Sit with leadership teams and earn their trust - not by nodding but by asking the questions nobody else in the room is asking.
• Map how their business really works (not how the org chart says it works) and find the places where software, automation, and AI create real leverage.
• Own delivery across a portfolio of high-value accounts and strategic internal initiatives.
• Translate business problems into product plans - workflows, edge cases, dependencies, risks, UX, the whole thing - before developers touch a keyboard.
• Pressure-test ideas, including your own. Challenge weak assumptions. Kill bad features early. Fight relentlessly for the ones that matter.
• Work shoulder-to-shoulder with developers so requirements are crisp, handoffs are clean, and nobody is guessing.
• Spot the AI opportunity in each client’s operation, not the flashy idea that sounds impressive or creates the illusion of progress, but the one that actually removes painful, time-wasting work from someone’s week.
• Improve how RAD itself scopes, plans, documents, and delivers. You're not just running the machine. You're making the machine better.
• Help shape new engagements before they start. You'll be actively involved in presales and scoping - sitting in on discovery calls, defining the actual problem, and helping define what the engagement should look like before a contract is signed.

Scope & structure

A few details that strong candidates always want to know:

Clients. RAD works with companies ranging from roughly $10M to $200M in revenue - operationally complex businesses where software, automation, and AI can have an outsized impact. You'll work across industries, but the common thread is that these are real operators running real businesses with real friction in their workflows.

Portfolio. You'll own 3–5 accounts at a time. Enough to go deep, not so many that you're skimming the surface.

Ownership. You're involved from discovery and presales through delivery and outcomes. You help shape the engagement, then you lead it. You don't hand off a scope doc and disappear.

How you work. This is not a management role. You don't have direct reports. RAD works in small pods per client typically 1-3 engineers and you're the person making sure each pod has sharp direction, clear requirements, and momentum. Your influence comes from the quality of your thinking, not a title. You report to RAD's Director of Operations.

Location. This is an in-office role in Downtown Scottsdale. Client work is handled from the office and over calls. Travel is rare.

Requirements

Who you are

You think from first principles. Frameworks are tools, not crutches. When something doesn't make sense, you say so kindly, but clearly.
You have real executive presence. You can hold your own in a room with a founder who's skeptical of consultants and walk out with them leaning forward.

You have strong product instincts. You know the difference between a feature and a solution, between a workflow and a workaround, between "technically done" and "actually useful."

You're technically fluent without being an engineer. You understand APIs, integrations, databases, and how modern software gets built - enough to collaborate with developers as a peer, not a translator.

You've actually used AI tools - Claude, OpenAI, whatever model in real working environments. You've prototyped something. You've mapped a workflow with them. You've replaced a task you used to do manually. You have opinions about where AI helps and where it's still a party trick, and those opinions come from use, not from reading about it.

You create structure in ambiguity. You don't need perfect clarity to start moving - you generate the clarity.

You like solving business problems more than you like managing tasks. The task management is just what makes the problem-solving show up on time.

What you've probably done before

Some combination of: product management, product strategy, solutions consulting, delivery leadership, operations, or technical program management inside a software consultancy, startup, product studio, or in-house product team. Bonus points for workflow-heavy systems (CRMs, ATS platforms, internal ops tools, automation platforms), digital transformation work, or hands-on experience with AI prototyping tools to validate ideas fast.

What matters more than the resume is the pattern: you've repeatedly walked into complexity and left behind clarity and working systems.

This role is not for you if...

• You want to stay far from clients and leadership conversations.
• You can't form an opinion on product direction until someone else does first.
• You talk about AI in the abstract but haven't actually shipped anything with it.
• You need the brief to be perfectly written before you can start.
• "Not my job" is a phrase you reach for.

We're being blunt here because hiring the wrong person for this seat costs everyone… especially you.

What success looks like in year one

Clients describe you as a strategic partner, not a coordinator. RAD is more embedded and more valuable inside the businesses we serve. Projects are better-defined before a single line of code gets written. Developers get cleaner inputs and hit fewer surprises. Leadership spends less time patching execution gaps because you've already closed them. And the clients you work with point to measurable operational wins they can tie directly back to the work.

Benefits

The RAD side of the deal

We are a tight-knit team that cares deeply about the work and about the business owners we serve. We work hard, we move fast, and we actually like being around each other. No corporate fluff, no dress code, and no sitting quietly on the sidelines. You will have a real voice in the work, in the process, and in where the company goes.

Compensation & perks

• Competitive salary based on experience
• 4 weeks PTO
• Annual RAD Retreat (new destination every year)
• Comprehensive medical, dental, and vision
• 401(k) with up to 4% match, Roth option available
• Company MacBook
• Daily lunches, plus free drinks and snacks in the office (yes, including a keg of cold brew coffee)
• Our office in the heart of Downtown Scottsdale
• RAD swag, obviously