Director, Product Strategy & Operations

Adobe Inc.; San Jose (CA); On-site; USD 150,000 - 200,000; Full time

Job summary

Adobe Inc. is seeking a strategic Director of Strategy & Operations in San Jose, CA. This role involves designing operating models for Adobe's AI-powered creative products.

As a senior leadership position, you will ensure accountability across various teams, drive operational excellence, and support Adobe's mission to empower creativity through innovative platforms.

Qualifications

• 12+ years of experience in product strategy, business operations, or consulting.
• 5+ years in a senior leadership capacity.
• Experience in complex operating rhythms and governance.

Responsibilities

• Design and own the organization’s operating model.
• Drive cross-functional execution excellence.
• Lead a high-performing product strategy and operations team.

Skills

Operational rigor

Financial competence

Analytical problem-solving

Communication skills

Education

Bachelor’s degree

MBA or equivalent operational experience

Job description

The Opportunity

Creative Product Group is seeking a strategic Director of Strategy & Operations who is driven by clear achievements. This role sits at the center of a portfolio of AI-powered creative products—including Adobe Firefly, Photoshop, Premiere Pro, and more—and is responsible for building the operating infrastructure that connects strategy to execution across a large, multi-product engineering and product organization.

In this role, you will work in close partnership with the Senior Director of CPG S&O, owning distinct, high‑priority workstreams while collectively building the operating infrastructure for one of Adobe’s most strategically important product organizations. This is not a support role; it is a senior leadership position with real ownership, executive visibility, and a mandate to build.

You will partner closely with Product, Engineering, Finance, Sales, Marketing, and Executive Leadership to translate strategy into operating rhythms, driving accountability across the leadership team, and ensuring that resources are deployed against the highest priorities.

What you’ll do

• Design, Implement, and Scale the Operating Model
  • Design and own the organization’s operating cadence: QBRs, annual planning cycles, leadership syncs, and business reviews.
  • Build and maintain systems, processes, and tools that enable the organization to operate at scale—from goal tracking and decision frameworks to cross‑functional dependency management.
  • Define decision rights, critical issue paths, and accountability mechanisms; standardize planning artifacts, critical metric dashboards, and reporting structures.
  • Own objectives and key results development and accountability across the organization—establishing clear ownership, defining measurable outcomes, and ensuring consistent progress tracking.
  • Own the operating forums and cadences for reviewing critical metric performance, ensuring leadership alignment on business health and progress against strategic goals.
  • Lead the rollout of a shared operating model across multiple product areas—starting with the highest‑priority product and expanding as the model proves out.
  • Partner with embedded PGM and BizOps leads to drive adoption of shared frameworks while adapting for team‑specific needs.
  • Build a community of practice across the portfolio that creates coordination and consistency without centralizing control.
• Drive Cross‑Functional Execution Excellence
  • Align Product, Engineering, Design, and GTM around shared objectives and measurable outcomes.
  • Ensure roadmap commitments are realistic, capacity‑aligned, and financially justified.
  • Increase transparency and predictability across product development cycles.
  • Identify operational inefficiencies and implement process improvements to improve velocity and output quality.
  • Improve cross‑functional handoffs and reduce execution friction.
  • Establish performance management mechanisms that surface risks early and enable course correction.
• Lead with Accountability
  • Build and lead a high‑performing product strategy and business operations team.
  • Set clear performance expectations and measurable objectives for the team.
  • Foster a culture of data‑driven decision‑making, ownership, and continuous improvement.
  • This role starts as a senior IC position with a clear path to building and leading a team as the operating model scales—the right person will shape what that team looks like.

What you’ll need to succeed

• 12+ years of experience across product strategy, business operations, product management, finance, or consulting, with at least 5 years in a senior leadership capacity.
• Demonstrated experience owning portfolio‑level business performance and operational governance.
• Proven track record of designing and running complex operating rhythms—including annual planning cycles, objectives and key results, and executive‑level business reviews—with exceptional precision and follow‑through.
• Prior experience supporting a global large‑scale product, engineering or technology organization is strongly preferred. A background in management consulting, investment banking, or an internal strategy/operations role at a technology company is a plus.
• Demonstrated ability to operate within large, global, matrixed organizations and drive alignment across diverse collaborators.

Skills & Capabilities

• Exceptional operational rigor: follow‑through, accuracy, and bringing structure and rigor to complex, fast‑moving initiatives.
• Strong financial competence and comfort navigating forecasting and budget models.
• Exceptional analytical and problem‑solving skills, with the ability to synthesize complex data into clear, actionable insights and executive‑level recommendations.
• Ability to build trust quickly across all levels of an organization, from individual contributors to C‑suite executives.
• Outstanding written and verbal communication skills; able to create crisp, executive‑quality content quickly and under pressure.
• Comfort operating with discretion on sensitive organizational and strategic matters.

Leadership Qualities

• Calm under pressure, with the judgment to prioritize ruthlessly when everything feels urgent.
• A natural collaborator who builds bridges across functions.
• Committed to building an inclusive team culture where diverse perspectives are valued.

Education and Preferred Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree required; MBA or equivalent operational experience strongly preferred.
• Prior experience at a large‑scale SaaS, technology, or digital media company.
• Experience in a creative, AI, or consumer software environment strongly preferred.

About Adobe

Adobe empowers everyone to create through innovative platforms and tools that unleash creativity, productivity and personalized customer experiences. Adobe’s industry‑leading offerings—including Adobe Acrobat Studio, Adobe Express, Adobe Firefly, Creative Cloud, Adobe Experience Platform, Adobe Experience Manager, and GenStudio—enable people and businesses to turn ideas into impact, powered by AI and driven by human ingenuity.

Our 30,000+ employees worldwide are creating the future and raising the bar as we drive the next decade of growth. We’re on a mission to hire the very best and believe in creating a company culture where all employees are empowered to make an impact.

Adobe is proud to be an Equal Employment Opportunity employer. We do not discriminate based on gender, race or color, ethnicity or national origin, age, disability, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, veteran status, or any other protected characteristic. Learn more.