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Salary: USD 232,000 - 372,000 / annual
Rachio is seeking a Director of Product Hardware to lead the company's physical product portfolio and strategy. This is a senior leadership role responsible for owning the hardware roadmap across smart sprinkler controllers, hose timers, outdoor lighting, and OEM/partner products, along with their tethered software experiences in the Rachio app.
Key responsibilities include:
**Strategy & Roadmap**: Own the devices roadmap for new products, line extensions, and lifecycle management of launched products. Lead data-driven prioritization using customer research, product telemetry, support/returns data, channel input, competitive intelligence, and market trends. Co-lead new product strategy development with leadership and translate it into executable plans for Engineering and Supply Chain.
**Product Definition & Development Process**: Write "working backwards" documents defining customer problems, value propositions, target pricing, and success criteria. Develop detailed business requirements and user stories spanning hardware, firmware, and app experiences. Run the hardware product development process (PDP) as a mechanism with clear stage gates from concept through EVT, DVT, PVT, and ramp. Contribute to engineering decisions on technology, architecture, radios, protocols, sensors, power, and enclosures with sufficient technical fluency.
**Cross-Functional Integration**: Partner with Supply Chain from concept forward on cost targets, supplier selection, tooling, and certification timelines. Own product inputs to supply/demand planning including launch quantities, ramp assumptions, and end-of-life plans. Identify and resolve strategic issues (component shortages, cost overruns, schedule slips, quality escapes) that impact goals.
**Go-to-Market & Launch**: Partner with the Director of Product Marketing on hardware GTM launches. Own launch readiness including certification, firmware/app readiness, in-box content, and support documentation. Create internal and external commitment to the roadmap with Rain Bird, retailers, distributors, and OEM partners. Close the post-launch feedback loop on customer confusion, returns, and support issues.
**Customer Insights & Measurement**: Own product discovery across homeowners and professional installers through interviews, surveys, field visits, and data analysis. Instrument products for measurable success: activation, engagement, return rate, defect/warranty rates, CSAT/NPS, and software/subscription attach.
This is explicitly a hands-on individual contributor role in a flat organization. Influence comes from product judgment, writing clarity, and credibility with engineers and designers—not headcount. You are expected to step in and fill gaps between product and launch. You will operate at startup velocity across projects in different stages: finding product/market fit for new concepts, accelerating fledgling products, and scaling mature ones.
**Requirements**
Minimum Qualifications:
- 10+ years of technical experience in product management, product marketing, program management, or engineering, including significant time owning hardware products end-to-end
- 5+ years of full-lifecycle consumer hardware/devices product management experience as the lead PM: concept, definition, development, launch, and lifecycle management
- 3+ years of professional experience working with mobile apps and/or connected consumer devices
- Comfort operating as a hands-on individual contributor
- Experience contributing to engineering discussions around technology decisions and strategy, including electrical and mechanical engineering and industrial design trade-offs
- Working knowledge of embedded firmware, mobile technology, web services, and back-end application infrastructure
- Experience coordinating hardware development cycles with software development schedules and leading cross-functional teams on tight deadlines
- Experience taking new hardware concepts from raw intuition through fast, measurable tests to a decision (including failed concepts)
- Strong analytical foundation: practical working knowledge of statistics and one or more of SQL, Python, or R for ad hoc analysis; comfort defending assumptions
- Exceptional written communication; ability to distill complex trade-offs into narratives leadership can act on
- Bachelor's degree
Desired Qualifications:
- Experience building a hardware product development process (NPI/PDP) from scratch or materially rebuilding one
- Experience shipping products through contract manufacturers, including EVT/DVT/PVT builds, DFM, certification (FCC, UL, CE), and factory visits
- Experience with smart home platforms and protocols (Matter, Thread, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth) and their platform partners
- Experience in two-step distribution or professional trade channels (irrigation, landscape, electrical, HVAC, plumbing, building products) alongside retail and D2C
- Experience with outdoor products, lighting, water management, or sustainability categories
- Experience with partner, OEM, or white-label hardware programs
- Hands-on experience maintaining a residential yard and irrigation system (or willing and able to)
- Engineering degree, MBA, or advanced degree
