Liquid Program/Product Manager

Title: Remote Liquid Program/Product Manager
Duration: 6++ months/Temp to Hire
Location: Remote - must be located near a hub (Miramar FL, Dallas TX, Minneapolis MN, Atlanta GA)

1) Role Scope and Business Context
David explained that the position supports one of the company’s two major “mega apps” on the trade side of the business.
The trade side refers to internally facing applications used by teams such as:
sales leaders finance leaders trade development teams
The product area is tied to annual fiscal planning, forecasting, budgeting, and goal setting for suppliers and the internal sales organization.
David emphasized that this role is not for the annual forecasting application itself; rather, it supports the downstream application that turns planning into execution.

The application associated with the role is referred to as Program Manager / Liquid Program Manager and is used to:
distribute goals to salespeople
track performance against those goals
support promotions/incentives and other execution programs
The app functions as a hub to downstream systems, meaning it feeds data to multiple other applications.

2) Collaboration and Communication Expectations
David repeatedly stressed that this role requires strong communication and collaboration skills.
Because the product is internally facing, the person in this role will work heavily with:
internal business stakeholders
sales leaders
trade development leaders
architectural teams
engineering and QA
design teams
downstream application partners

He described the ideal candidate as someone who is comfortable engaging with senior internal leaders and translating business strategy into tactical execution.
The role is expected to serve as a liaison between strategy and implementation, ensuring business needs are converted into actionable product work.

3) Team Structure and Day-to-Day Responsibilities
The role sits within a large team ecosystem that includes:
another product owner for the sister annual planning application
an engineering team of roughly 10 people across senior/staff engineers and QA
design resources
architecture support
a Scrum Master-style support role called a “value orchestrator”
This person will report to David, who described himself as the group product owner or portfolio-level owner for multiple products.

Key responsibilities include:
owning the roadmap vision
working with business stakeholders to define priorities
collaborating with design to bring concepts to life
partnering with engineering and architecture on sequencing and execution
breaking work into manageable agile deliverables
supporting sprint planning and ongoing delivery
David noted that the role is both strategic and tactical, not just a “big picture” product role.

4) Tools and Methodology
David identified several tools and working methods used by the team:
Jira for epics, stories, and the development lifecycle
Miro for whiteboarding, collaboration, storyboarding, and visual concepting
Agile/Scrum practices for delivery and planning
He said familiarity with Jira and Miro would be helpful, but he was open to candidates who have used comparable tools.
He emphasized the value of someone who can “drive the bus” and help define the product vision, then execute it through agile delivery.

5) Ideal Background and Candidate Profile
client stated that he is open to candidates from different backgrounds and does not require a rigid checklist such as a specific number of years in CPG.
He is looking for common traits across strong candidates, including:
ability to drive technical delivery
comfort managing multiple moving parts across engineering, architecture, and design
strong communication and collaboration
product ownership experience or strong product-adjacent leadership experience
Industry background in sales-related environments, CPG, or similar distributed-goal settings would be beneficial, but not mandatory.
Since the company is a distributor of alcohol, familiarity with sales organization concepts and goal distribution would be helpful.

7) AI/Product Future Direction
A question was asked about whether AI product experience would be beneficial.
David responded that AI is relevant to the roadmap and future direction of the product.
He explained that the team is exploring AI concepts such as:
language-model-based question answering
pulling insights from internal datasets
incorporating market trend intelligence into planning workflows
He clarified that the team is not a BI or data science team, but it will collaborate with AI teams and layer intelligence into the planning tools.
AI experience would therefore be a plus, since it aligns with where the product is heading.

8) Clarifications on Tools
A participant confirmed the spelling of Miro.
David elaborated that Miro is used for collaborative whiteboarding and visually capturing complex ideas, especially because the products involve complex workflows and algorithms.
He also reiterated that Jira is the system used for managing stories, epics, and the overall development lifecycle through production.



Must-Have Skills:
#1 Collaboration Skills & Communication Skills
Product Owner
Jira
Miro
AI Concepts or AI product experience
Agile/Scrum
Developed Road Maps

Education and Experience:
BA

Overview:
As the Product Manager for Liquid Program Manager, you’ll chart the course of the primary experience our trade development teams use to set, manage, distribute and track the sales goals we establish with our supplier partners and connect to our sales teams through other digital solutions. We’re in the early stages of building out our trade experiences, and you’ll have the opportunity to establish strategic product direction, develop product roadmaps, manage product backlogs and lead product teams that create an connected multi-product ecosystem leveraging AI and agents to automate work, personalize interactions, and distill ten thousand goals a month into clear direction for our sales machine.

You’ll work cross-functionally with design, engineering, data science, and key partners in our commercial organization to imagine and build end-to-end experiences with the user at the center.  This role is critical in shaping our trade development product ecosystem. 

Responsibilities:
Lead strategy and roadmap for trade development experiences aligned with our commercial organization
Translate user needs and commercial business priorities into integrated experiences that empower our trade development teams
Serve as a strategic partner to our commercial and trade development teams, ensuring priorities are aligned, well communicated, and progressing to plan.
Collaborate with design and engineering teams to shape the experience and build on a modern tech stack.
Define and prioritize features using a test-and-learn mindset, leveraging metrics such as reducing commercial planning time and effort.
Maintain a deep understanding of trade developer needs and collaborate with commercial stakeholders to ensure the experience supports shared objectives.