Product Manager, Online Audio & ProgrammingProduct Manager, Online Audio & Programming
Tracking Code
170509
Job Description
A thriving, mission-drivenmultimedia organization, NPR produces award-winning news, information, and music programming in partnership with hundreds of independent public radio stations across the nation. NPR listeners value information, creativity, curiosity, and social responsibility - our employees do too. We are innovators and leaders in diverse fields, from journalism and digital media to IT and development. Every day, our employees and member stations touch the lives of millions worldwide.
Join our newly-formed Digital Services team located in Boston's Innovation District, and work with our member stations nationwide to develop digital strategies and capabilities that will grow audience in local markets. We are looking for individuals who have innovative ideas and rock-solid skills, who thrive in a fast-paced, start-up like environment and who believe in what we do.
Role Summary
Product Managers guide the product definition, creation, and improvement process by bringing together a wide range of experts, including audience research, software development, user experience, editorial and design staff as well as working directly with clients and end-users.
As a member of the new Digital Services Product Team, this position is responsible for the definition, strategy and overall success of a series of online products with a focus on managing radio station program schedules and music playlists, audio encoding and online players, podcasting, and integration with broadcast automation systems.
The ideal candidate has a passion for radio and a vision for its digital future, for disruptive technologies and unbounded curiosity for how media, technology, and people come together. This person enjoys inventing new approaches, collaborating with disparate actors including technologists, designers, editors, bloggers, radio and television partners, and sales and business partners. For this person, communicating and sharing lessons-learned is second nature and fun. This person looks forward to discovering the unexpected and approaches life with patience, wisdom, and a quick pulse.
Specific responsibilities include:
* Be the voice of the customer. Gather, synthesize and communicate a superior knowledge of customer needs. This includes gathering ongoing product feedback; managing defect and feature requests from end-users and station-customers; Monitoring customer behavior/analytics; commissioning audience research and user testing; and having a deep understanding of the competitive and equivalent product landscape.
* Translate end-user needs and product objectives into a product strategy and prioritized user stories; maintain a prioritized request backlog; manage product defects; approve completed work; and provide sufficient product definition to enable an execution team.
* Manage the needs of internal stakeholders; incorporating key business objectives into the product strategy and communicating effectively across (and up) the organization. Serve as the product expert for the communications and sales teams to assist in client communications, sales and marketing materials. Train the client services and QA teams on the product and provide regular updates.
* Be the external voice of the product and product duce and deliver product demos, public presentations and other expert-level updates, such as feature-oriented screen casts and blog posts. Maintain a product roadmap / timeline of prioritized product improvements. Manage existing client expectations by communicating product decisions, progress and plans.
* Identify, evaluate, and manage external business partners, vendors, and 3rd-party services to provide key product capacities
Required Experience
Education:Bachelor's degree from an accredited four-year college or university or equivalent required. MBA or equivalent Masters degree preferred.
Required Skills:
* 6+ years relevant online work experience in software/web product management, project management, or product development.
* Demonstrated success guiding the creation of audio/music-focused solutions for web or mobile audiences. Additional web product/site leadership experience a plus.
* Deep knowledge of online audio, including encoding/transcoding technologies, interfacing with CDNs, digital audio file and stream formats, podcasting, audio editing tools, and web and mobile players.
* Familiarity with radio station program needs on the web - ideally, an understanding of program schedule and playlist management and radio station automation systems.
* Experience with rapid prototyping and/or agile software development methodology.
* Experience leveraging (and preferably executing) market research, competitive analysis, and software product user testing.
* Excellent written and oral communication skills. Proven ability to present/demo complex ideas and products to a large group, author compelling, public-facing product materials, and work directly with clients.
* Understanding of the creative process in a collaborative environment; ability to incorporate both internal stakeholder and user feedback; team player in a fast-paced work environment, always showing respect for the diverse constituencies at NPR and within the public radio system.
* Experience working on mobile products a big plus.
* Strong organizational skills and ability to work under tight deadlines; ability to multitask and self-manage the deadlines of competing projects.
Does this sound like you? If so, we want to hear from you. Please apply online through our career site at applicationsmustinclude a resume and cover letter to be considered. You can also follow us on Twitter at@nprjobs.
NPR offers a competitive compensation and comprehensive benefits package including health and wellness benefits, retirement, and work/life balance programs, as well as opportunities for career growth and development. NPR is an Equal Opportunity Employer.
Job Location
Boston, MA, US.
Position Type
Full-Time/Regular
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