Senior R&D Operations Specialist

Clio; Burnaby; Hybrid; CAD 126,000 - 171,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Competitive health benefits

Hybrid work environment (twice-weekly"

Flexible time off (20 days)

Counseling benefit ($2000)

RRSP matching and RESP

Clioversary recognition

Job summary

Clio seeks a Senior R&D Operations Specialist to scale operating systems, planning rhythms, and cross-functional coordination across Product, Design, Engineering, and Research. The role is remote across the United States or Canada (excluding Quebec); if local to Burnaby, Calgary, or Toronto, in-office presence is expected two days per week on Anchor Days.

You will help create the shared information layer that keeps teams aligned on goals, progress, and outcomes, with a focus on reducing friction

Qualifications

• 5+ years of experience in product operations, R&D operations, program management, business operations, strategy and operations, or a related role in a technology environment.
• Strong program management skills, with experience coordinating complex initiatives across multiple teams, leaders, and stakeholders.
• Excellent organizational skills, with a proven ability to create clarity, maintain follow-through, and ensure important details do not fall through the cracks.
• Strong communication and stakeholder management skills, with the ability to build trust and influence across senior leaders and cross-functional partners.
• Comfort navigating ambiguity and bringing structure to complex, evolving systems without creating unnecessary overhead.
• Strong analytical skills, with the ability to synthesize product, customer, operational, and business data into clear insights and recommendations.
• Experience or strong curiosity in using AI to increase operational leverage, including synthesizing information, improving workflows, reducing administrative burden, and helping teams move faster with more clarity.

Responsibilities

• Build and maintain clear sources of truth for portfolio priorities, milestones, dependencies, owners, decisions, risks, and progress.
• Strengthen the operating rhythms that help teams stay aligned, including planning cadences, leadership syncs, showcases, QBRs, all hands, and cross-functional forums.
• Create and manage workback plans for complex product initiatives, helping teams clarify milestones, dependencies, decision points, success measures, and follow-through.
• Improve horizontal coordination across Product, Design, Engineering, Research, GTM, Data, and other cross-functional partners, ensuring the right people are in the right conversations at the right time.
• Support the development, communication, and tracking of quarterly and annual OKRs, ensuring goals and metrics connect clearly across portfolios and teams.
• Partner with Strategy & Ops, Data, and GTM teams to bring product usage, customer, revenue, and market signals into regular R&D operating rhythms.
• Create lightweight templates, documentation, dashboards, and playbooks that reduce duplication, improve clarity, and help teams work together more effectively.

Skills

Program management

Cross-functional coordination

Organizational skills

Stakeholder management

Ambiguity navigation

Analytical skills

AI in operations

Job description

Clio is the global leader in legal AI technology, empowering legal professionals and law firms of every size to work smarter, faster, and more securely.

We are transforming the legal experience for all by bettering the lives of legal professionalswhile increasing access to justice.

Summary:

We are seeking a Senior R&D Operations Specialist to help scale the operating systems, planning rhythms, and cross-functional coordination that enable Clio’s Product, Design, Engineering, and Research teams to do their best work. This role is available to candidates across the United States or Canada (excluding Quebec) in a remote capacity. If you are local to one of our hubs (Burnaby, Calgary, or Toronto) you will be expected to be in office minimum two days per week for our Anchor Days.

This role will sit within R&D Operations and work closely with leaders across Clio Work, Enterprise, and related product areas to bring greater clarity, consistency, and momentum to complex, cross-functional work. You’ll help create the shared information layer that keeps teams aligned on where we’re going, why it matters, what success looks like, and how we’re progressing.

This is not a purely logistical role. We are looking for someone who is deeply organized and detail-oriented, but also curious about product strategy, customer value, business outcomes, and how teams work together. The right person will reduce friction, improve visibility, strengthen follow-through, and help teams coordinate horizontally across initiatives with less chaos and more impact.

What you’ll do

• Build and maintain clear sources of truth for portfolio priorities, milestones, dependencies, owners, decisions, risks, and progress.

• Strengthen the operating rhythms that help teams stay aligned, including planning cadences, leadership syncs, showcases, QBRs, all hands, and cross-functional forums.

• Create and manage workback plans for complex product initiatives, helping teams clarify milestones, dependencies, decision points, success measures, and follow-through.

• Improve horizontal coordination across Product, Design, Engineering, Research, GTM, Data, and other cross-functional partners, ensuring the right people are in the right conversations at the right time.

• Support the development, communication, and tracking of quarterly and annual OKRs, ensuring goals and metrics connect clearly across portfolios and teams.

• Partner with Strategy & Ops, Data, and GTM teams to bring product usage, customer, revenue, and market signals into regular R&D operating rhythms.

• Create lightweight templates, documentation, dashboards, and playbooks that reduce duplication, improve clarity, and help teams work together more effectively.

What you bring

• 5+ years of experience in product operations, R&D operations, program management, business operations, strategy and operations, or a related role in a technology environment.

• Strong program management skills, with experience coordinating complex initiatives across multiple teams, leaders, and stakeholders.

• Excellent organizational skills, with a proven ability to create clarity, maintain follow-through, and ensure important details do not fall through the cracks.

• Strong communication and stakeholder management skills, with the ability to build trust and influence across senior leaders and cross-functional partners.

• Comfort navigating ambiguity and bringing structure to complex, evolving systems without creating unnecessary overhead.

• Strong analytical skills, with the ability to synthesize product, customer, operational, and business data into clear insights and recommendations.

• Experience or strong curiosity in using AI to increase operational leverage, including synthesizing information, improving workflows, reducing administrative burden, and helping teams move faster with more clarity.

Where you excel

• You are a systems thinker who can see how people, processes, tools, data, and communication patterns connect.

• You are highly organized and detail-oriented, but not rigid. You create structure that helps teams move faster, not slower.

• You are proactive about spotting gaps, risks, unclear ownership, duplicated work, and misalignment before they become bigger problems.

• You are comfortable asking thoughtful questions when goals, metrics, narratives, or decisions do not seem to connect.

• You can translate strategic direction into operating rhythms, workback plans, dashboards, communication artifacts, and clear next steps.

• You build trust quickly by being reliable, clear, thoughtful, and pragmatic.

• You look for thoughtful ways to use AI to simplify workflows, synthesize information, and reduce administrative burden for the teams you support.

Bonus points if you have

• Experience supporting multi-product SaaS, enterprise software, or platform teams.

• Experience supporting annual planning, quarterly planning, QBRs, roadmap reviews, or executive operating rhythms.

• Experience creating dashboards, scorecards, or reporting mechanisms that inform leadership decisions.

• Experience working with product analytics, customer feedback systems, NPS, UMUX, revenue data, or customer insight programs.

• Experience supporting internal communications, leadership forums, or enablement programs for technical teams.

• Experience supporting change management or operational transformation in a growing R&D organization.

This is a new role.

What you will find here:

Compensation is one of the main components of Clio’s Total Rewards Program. We have developed a series of programs and processes to ensure we are creating fair and competitive pay practices that form the foundation of our human and high-performing culture.

Some highlights of our Total Rewards program include:

• Competitive, equitable salary with top-tier health benefits, dental, and vision insurance

• Hybrid work environment, with expectation for local Clions (Vancouver, Calgary, Toronto, Dublin, London, New York City and Sydney) to be in office min. twice per week.

• Flexible time off policy, with an encouraged 20 days off per year.

• $2000 annual counseling benefit

• RRSP matching and RESP contribution

• Clioversary recognition program with special acknowledgement at 3, 5, 7, and 10 years

The expected salary range* for this role is $126,200 to $148,500 to $170,800 CAD. There are a separate set of salary bands for other regions based on local currency.

*Our salary bands are designed to reflect the range of skills and experience needed for the position and to allow room for growth at Clio. For experienced individuals, we typically hire at or around the midpoint of the band. The top portion of the salary band is reserved for employees who demonstrate sustained high performance and impact at Clio. Those who are new to the role may join below the midpoint and develop their skills over time. The final offer amount for this role will be dependent on geographical region, applicable experience, and skillset of the candidate.

Diversity, Inclusion, Belonging and Equity (DIBE) & Accessibility

We are dedicated todiversity, equity and inclusion. We pride ourselves in building and fostering an environment where our teams feel included, valued, and enabled to do the best work of their careers, wherever they choose to log in from. We believe that different perspectives, skills, backgrounds, and experiences result in higher-performing teams and better innovation. We are committed to equal employment and we encourage candidates from all backgrounds to apply.

Clio provides accessibility accommodations during the recruitment process. Should you require any accommodation, please let us know and we will work with you to meet your needs.

Learn more about our culture atclio.com/careers

We’re a Human and High Performing AI company, meaning we use artificial intelligence to improve all of our operations. In recruitment, AI helps us streamline the process for greater efficiency. However, we’ve built our systems to ensure that a human always reviews AI-generated output, and we never make automated hiring decisions.

_ Disclaimer: We only communicate with candidates through official @clio.com email addresses._