Director, Platform Engineering (Product Management)

Appian; Chennai District; On-site; INR 4,000,000 - 8,000,000; Full time

Job summary

Appian seeks a Group Product Lead to drive the strategy and delivery of cloud-native infrastructure across multiple teams. You will oversee product management execution, align backlogs with the company’s vision, and collaborate with worldwide engineering teams to accelerate innovations in Appian Cloud.

The ideal candidate has a strong backend and infrastructure focus, extensive leadership experience, and a passion for scalable, secure SaaS platforms built with AWS services and Kubernetes.

Qualifications

• Proven leadership experience managing product managers or similar teams.
• Strong background in cloud-native infrastructure and SaaS platforms.
• Deep knowledge of Kubernetes and cloud services, with security/compliance awareness.

Responsibilities

• Oversee product management execution for cloud-native infrastructure and services.
• Lead multi-team backlog strategy aligned to product vision and goals.
• Collaborate with engineering, sales, and executives to drive strategy and roadmap.
• Mentor and develop the next generation of product leaders.

Skills

Kubernetes

Leadership

Cloud-native

AWS EKS

Back-end infra

Security/compliance

Cross-functional

Communication

Job description

Overview

Here at Appian, our values of Intensity and Excellence define who we are. We set high standards and live up to them, ensuring that everything we do is done with care and quality. We approach every challenge with ambition and commitment, holding ourselves and each other accountable to achieve the best results. When you join Appian, you’ll be part of a passionate team dedicated to accomplishing hard things, together. This role combines experienced product management leadership with the pivotal responsibilities of a Group Product Lead, offering an opportunity to shape the product strategy and the missions of several teams.

Role and reporting

You will oversee product management execution working closely with the product managers for several cross-functional software engineering teams around the world. This position reports to the Head of Product for the Platform Engineering Strategic Business Unit, which is responsible for Appian Cloud offering. An excellent candidate will bring extensive experience in a product leadership role in the cloud infrastructure domain at a software-as-a-service firm. The product portfolio owned by this position covers cloud native infrastructure and services – from highly available, resilient, scalable, and efficient infrastructure components to the scalable, enterprise-grade managed services that power the backend data persistence and event streams for customer sites in Appian Cloud. You will provide product management leadership for initiatives that deliver efficient and scalable infrastructure, core compute capacity, and managed data planes as multi-tenant services to accelerate the innovations of Engineering teams throughout the department.

Scope and portfolio

Your portfolio will include aspects that intersect with AWS account and VPC topology, Kubernetes clusters, network mesh, and edge web layer, as well as efforts to transform existing systems and software components into cloud-native, Kubernetes-based and multi-tenant managed services while achieving incremental value for our customers from intermediate milestones. You\'ll form strong relationships with counterparts within the Engineering department as well as stakeholders in other departments. You will oversee the creation of an impactful vision and ensure alignment between the product managers in your group and the roadmaps of the feature teams that rely on the services and frameworks provided by your organization. You will be accountable for the business impact of the features your group delivers, including owning the product strategy and feature backlog and ensuring effectiveness and adherence to standard product management processes.

Location

This position is based at our office in Chennai, India. Appian was built on a culture of in-person collaboration, which we believe is a key driver of our mission to be the best. This role will be 5 days office based from 11th Floor, Tower B, Brigade World Trade Center, Chennai.

What you'll do

• Oversee the initiation, planning, execution, and rollout for strategic initiatives.
• Lead the creation and ongoing maintenance of a multi-team, short-term and long-term feature backlogs strongly aligned to product and corporate vision.
• Initiate and facilitate conversations across business units and departments to reach alignment on strategy, roadmap, key investments and messaging.
• Build relationships with key business stakeholders, keeping them apprised of important features, critical scope changes, planned investments.
• Help identify and cultivate the next generation of product management leaders.
• Provide constructive feedback on feature specifications to ensure new feature delivery provides optimal impact.
• Coach product managers on balancing functional and non-functional enhancements and system improvements.
• Continuously enhance and improve the product management processes and techniques at Appian.

About you

• Strong technical background, likely as a former software architect or developer.
• Proven people management skills in guiding product managers to success.
• Passion for backend and infrastructure technologies powering cloud-based enterprise software, including proprietary, open-source, and industry-standard components, especially within the Cloud Native Computing Foundation landscape.
• Experience with cloud-native technologies and Kubernetes.
• Exposure to the infrastructure behind SaaS cloud product offerings is highly desirable.
• Understanding of networking and cross-VPC connectivity and security/compliance requirements for enterprise customers; experience with zero trust connectivity is a strong asset.
• Understanding of data persistence, object storage, event streaming platforms, multi-tenant shared services, and associated security/compliance requirements for enterprise customers.
• Experience delivering cloud infrastructure features built using AWS services such as EKS, ECR, transit gateways, WAFs, and Global Accelerator (or equivalents from other providers).
• Strong focus on scalability, performance, security, observability, and reliability of distributed systems.
• Excellent communication skills, comfortable discussing high-level strategy with executives and detailed feature work with engineers.

Training, growth, and culture

Training and Development: Onboarding focuses on equipping new hires with role-specific skills and knowledge through department-specific training. Continuous learning is a core focus at Appian, with dedicated mentorship and the First-Friend program as widely utilized resources for new hires.

Growth Opportunities: Appian offers diverse growth opportunities, including leadership programs for new and aspiring managers, Appian University, skills-based training, and tuition reimbursement for further education.

Community: We are committed to an inclusive culture with employee-led affinity groups that foster internal and external networks and community initiatives.

Benefits

Appian offers a comprehensive benefits package to support health, wellbeing, and financial future. Benefits may include health coverage, EAP with free mental health support, life and disability insurance, an Employee Stock Purchase Program, a retirement plan, wellness dollars, tuition reimbursement, family-forming benefits, and more. Benefits vary by country; please check with the Talent Acquisition contact for location-specific details.

About Appian

Appian provides AI automation for mission-critical work. Our platform is known for reliability and scale, built over more than 25 years of experience. For more information, visit appian.com. Nasdaq: APPN.

Equal Opportunity

Appian is an equal opportunity employer, and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to any protected characteristic. Reasonable accommodations are provided as required by law. For accommodations, contact [e-mail].