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Salary: USD 207,000 - 331,200 / annual
Axon is seeking a Senior Principal Technical Program Manager to lead the company's most complex, high-risk programs across R&D and the broader organization. You will own organization-level and company-level initiatives requiring alignment across multiple pillars, executive stakeholders, and multiple TPMs. You will serve as the strategic advisor senior leadership turns to when work has no obvious owner, the solution is unknown, and the consequences of failure are significant.
In this role, you will identify problems and opportunities before requirements exist, define strategy, translate it into executable plans, and drive alignment across people, resources, and commitments. You will operate as a strategic advisor to senior product and engineering leadership, including the RTO SVP, CTO, and their directs. You will surface risks before they become issues and help shape both short-term execution and long-term technical direction.
The Real-Time Operations team builds, deploys, and maintains products for emergency responders around the Axon Fusus platform. Production outages, functional regressions, or performance degradation lasting even minutes can have real customer impact, making reliability and operational resilience critical.
Key responsibilities include: leading Axon's most complex cross-organization technical programs spanning multiple R&D pillars and business functions; owning organization-level or company-level outcomes from early strategy through execution, launch, and post-production; leading programs involving multiple TPMs with clear ownership and accountability; identifying high-impact problems before requirements exist and translating them into strategy and executable plans; driving alignment across engineering, product, business, legal, information security, policy, and other organizations; owning program plans, schedules, resourcing strategies, and change management; driving company-level accountability for commitments, dependencies, and critical milestones; foreseeing systemic risks and establishing prevention mechanisms; defining success metrics for large-scale initiatives; owning or guiding end-to-end technical requirements across complex systems; bringing senior engineering leaders together on architecture and difficult technical trade-offs; challenging technical assumptions on data stores, caching, system architecture, and technology stacks; leading strategic technical discussions around scalability, reliability, availability, and operational resilience; advising Directors, VPs, SVPs, and executive leaders on portfolio strategy and execution risk; writing and presenting strategy documents; presenting to the RTO SVP, company CTO, and their directs; leading programs in novel or unexplored areas with high risk and uncertain solutions; leading initiatives extending beyond R&D requiring broader company alignment; defining and standardizing TPM artifacts, tools, and operating mechanisms; creating mechanisms that improve decision-making and accountability at scale; raising the bar for AI application in execution and program management; mentoring Principal TPMs and senior technical leaders; interviewing and calibrating candidates through Principal TPM, Staff Engineer, and Director levels; educating leaders and teams on program management practice and technical execution; working effectively across multiple teams, organizations, and time zones.
Success milestones: Within 90 days, you will take ownership of a company-critical initiative, develop a clear assessment of its state, and surface risks and structural issues leadership is actively addressing. Within 6 months, you will establish strong cross-organization operating mechanisms with holding commitments and senior leaders using your strategy for roadmap and resourcing decisions. Within 12 months, you will deliver meaningful results across organizations, create mechanisms that scale beyond your immediate programs, and materially raise technical program management effectiveness.
REQUIREMENTS:
- Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Science, or related field (Master's or PhD optional)
- 12 to 15+ years of experience managing complex software or hardware/software delivery
- 2 to 3 years of experience as a technical individual contributor, engineer, or equivalent hands-on technical role, or comparable technical depth developed through career
- Proven record of leading highly complex, high-risk programs across multiple organizations with significant executive visibility
- Experience leading programs with multiple TPMs, engineering organizations, and cross-functional stakeholders
- Experience driving alignment and accountability at organization or company level without direct reporting authority
- Deep technical judgment and ability to engage credibly with Principal and Distinguished Engineers, engineering VPs, and executive leadership
- Ability to evaluate end-to-end architecture, identify long-term cost of poor technical decisions, and distinguish meaningful technical risk from inflated information
- Mastery of program management practice and ability to select, adapt, and teach multiple delivery methodologies
- Demonstrated record of creating mechanisms that improve execution across multiple teams or organizations
- Experience advising senior executives and shaping strategy with SVP- and CTO-level stakeholders
- Experience writing strategy documents that influence short- and long-term technical or organizational direction
- Proven ability to define problems and establish direction in areas where requirements, ownership, or solutions do not yet exist
- Experience leading novel initiatives where technical path is uncertain and consequences of failure are significant
- Strong executive communication skills and ability to challenge senior leaders respectfully and directly
- Strong influencing, mentoring, and coaching skills
- Experience scaling processes across multiple organizations and time zones
- Preference for experience with enterprise SaaS or mission-critical software
- Connection to Axon's values and mission to tackle public safety's biggest challenges
