Senior Technical Program Manager

About this role

SENIOR TECHNICAL PROGRAM MANAGER – NODA AI

Location: Austin, TX (Hybrid on-site, with up to 10% travel)

Clearance Requirement: U.S. Citizen with the ability to obtain a security clearance

ABOUT NODA

NODA is a Veteran-owned, venture-backed technology company that is transforming how unmanned systems collaborate in complex, mission-critical environments. We are developing next-generation solutions that enable the autonomous orchestration of heterogeneous unmanned systems across air, sea, land, and space with vital applications in the defense, intelligence, and commercial sectors.

Our Technical Program Managers serve as the connective tissue between engineering execution and program delivery, translating complex, multi-domain autonomy requirements into disciplined, on-time delivery.

Joining NODA means working on meaningful technology that pushes the boundaries of autonomy alongside a team that thrives on innovation, rapid iteration, and collaboration.

THE ROLE

As Senior Technical Program Manager for Core Engineering, you own the day-to-day coordination fabric of the team: sprint ceremonies, cross-team dependencies, requirement intake and refinement, release coordination, and status reporting. You free engineering leads to focus on engineering by absorbing the coordination load that currently falls on them. Jira is your system of record and requirement management is your craft.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

- Lead requirement intake and refinement sessions, translating product intent into clear, testable, well-scoped engineering requirements and own associated acceptance criteria.

- Maintain requirement traceability from initiative → epic → story → acceptance criteria so every unit of work maps to a stated need and a definition of done.

- Enforce scope discipline through the release cycle; manage changes through an explicit intake and change-control process.

- Keep initiative, epic, and story status current in Jira; own the blocked-initiative log and coordinate with Project Engineers on state transitions.

- Enforce Jira hygiene conventions (fields, labels, components, definition-of-ready/done) so the tool remains a reliable system of record.

- Own and run all Core Engineering sprint ceremonies — planning, standup, review, retro, and backlog refinement — including agenda prep, facilitation, follow-up notes, and action-item tracking.

- Manage cross-team dependencies across Core, Systems, Solutions, and Release Engineering, surfacing and resolving them before issues become a blocker.

- Produce concise, informative and audience relevant technical briefs to drive program forward.

REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS

- 8+ years of experience in technical program / project management for software engineering teams.

- Demonstrated mastery of requirement management — intake, refinement, traceability, and change control on complex programs.

- High Jira fluency, with the ability to configure dashboards, workflows and custom reports.

- Excellent verbal and written communication; able to synthesize and decompose strategic vision into clear executable plans.

- Experience standing up and driving adoption of new process framework / operating models from scratch.

- U.S. Citizen with the ability to obtain a security clearance for work.

PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS

- Experience in defense tech, aerospace, robotics, or another regulated/mission-critical domain.

- Agile or Project Management certifications such as SAFe, Scrum Alliance, PMP, Lean Six Sigma.

- Experience in product management, change management, or process improvement.

- Experience operating in a highly technical, AI forward team environment.

SKILLS & ATTRIBUTES

- Critical thinker, proactive and collaborative partner to engineering who prioritizes actions that drive efficiency at scale and takes pride in owning the work and continuously strive for iterative improvement.

- Treats requirements as a discipline, not paperwork — precise, structured, and allergic to ambiguity.

- Power-user mindset toward Jira; a steward of the workflow, not just a participant in it.

- Proactive communicator who surfaces risk early rather than waiting to be asked.

- Strong cross-functional facilitation skills serving as the liaison between Business, Product, and Engineering.

BENEFITS & PERKS

Our culture fosters collaboration, respect, and trust, empowering passionate people to do their best work. We offer a competitive salary, comprehensive benefits, and opportunities for career growth. In addition to an opportunity to take part in an innovative, collaborative and fast-growing business with a highly motivated and skilled team, we also take pride in taking care of our employees. Here are just a few ways that we show our appreciation:

- We offer comprehensive medical, dental, and vision plans

- 401(k) Retirement Savings Plan to invest in your long-term retirement goals + Company match

- Equity grants for new hires

- Unlimited PTO

- 11 Paid holidays

- Extremely generous company holiday calendar, including a holiday hiatus in November & December

- Generous Parental Leave

- Military Leave for annual training or service requirements

- FSA

- DCFSA

- HSA

- Professional Development Opportunities

- Access to One Medical https://www.onemedical.com/

- Mental Health Resources: We provide free mental health resources 24/7 including therapy and more. Additional work-life services, such as free legal and financial support, are available to you as well.

GROWTH PATH AT NODA

This role sits at the center of NODA's growing Technical Program Management function, and strong performers can grow in one of three directions:

- Senior TPM leadership. Progress into Staff and then Principal TPM, taking on ownership of the operating model across multiple engineering teams rather than a single team. At this level you're setting requirement management and Jira governance standards org-wide, managing a team of…