Lead Program Manager, Technology (opens in a new tab)

Justworks; New York (NY); On-site; USD 166,000 - 214,000; Full time

Job summary

Justworks is seeking a Lead Program Manager for its Technology Strategy & Operations team in New York City. You will accelerate delivery of high-impact initiatives across Product, Design, Engineering, Data, and Operations, acting as a bridge between functions with frameworks that streamline execution.

The role focuses on governance, resource planning, and risk management, with accountability across multiple product domains.

Qualifications

• 8+ years of experience in strategy, operations, management consulting, program management, product operations, or related cross-functional leadership.
• Experience leading highly ambiguous, cross-functional initiatives spanning multiple teams or business functions.
• Ability to translate emerging priorities into actionable plans, operating models and measurable outcomes.
• Strong business acumen and ability to evaluate trade-offs and long-term implications.

Responsibilities

• Lead multiple concurrent programs and advisory engagements across Product, Engineering, Design, Data, and Operations.
• Develop governance structures, operating rhythms, stakeholder alignment models, and success metrics.
• Coach program managers and cross-functional leaders on governance, risk management, and change.
• Synthesize complex information for executive decision-making and recommendations on prioritisation.

Skills

Program management

Cross-functional leadership

Stakeholder alignment

Executive communication

Job description

At Justworks, you’ll enjoy a welcoming and casual environment, great benefits, wellness program offerings, company retreats, and the ability to interact with and learn from leaders in the startup community. We work hard and care about our most prized asset - our people.

We’re helping businesses get off the ground by enabling them to focus on running their business. We solve HR issues. We’re data-driven and never stop iterating. If you’d like to work in a supportive, entrepreneurial environment, are interested in building something meaningful and having fun while doing it, we’d love to hear from you.

We're united by shared goals and shared motivations at Justworks. These are best summed up in our company values, which are reflected in our product and in our team.

If this sounds like you, you’ll fit right in.

About the Team / Technology Strategy & Operations

Our Program Management function plays a vital role in keeping Justworks’ Technology Division – comprising Product, Design, Engineering, and Data – focused and connected. We connect dots and break silos across teams by maintaining an effective operating cadence, managing strategic initiatives, and leading special projects that help translate strategy into execution.

Who You Are

You’re excited by the idea of leading initiatives across the organization and driving impact. Everything you deliver is backed by a solid strategy. You maintain confidence throughout all your projects and are committed to getting things done.

As a Lead Program Manager within the Technology team, you will work closely with Product, Design, Engineering, Data, and Operations to accelerate the delivery of high-impact initiatives that are critical to driving our strategy and alignment with company goals. You will drive product initiatives forward that have multiple stakeholders, competing deadlines, and many moving parts. In this role, you’ll act as a bridge between functions and teams, developing frameworks that streamline program execution, optimise resource allocation, and drive accountability across initiatives across multiple product domains.

What You Will Work On

• Partner with Technology and Business leaders to identify, assess, and shape high-priority initiatives before formal program investment decisions are made.
• Lead discovery efforts to determine whether emerging initiatives require dedicated program management support, lightweight operating structures, or alternative execution models.
• Establish program foundations for newly formed initiatives, including governance structures, operating rhythms, stakeholder alignment models, success metrics, and execution frameworks.
• Serve as a senior program leadership resource across the Technology portfolio, deploying into high-priority, high-risk, or complex initiatives to accelerate progress, stabilise execution, or unblock delivery.
• Lead multiple concurrent programs and advisory engagements spanning Product, Engineering, Design, Data, Operations, and other cross-functional business teams.
• Assess program health across the portfolio, identifying systemic risks, execution gaps, organisational dependencies, and opportunities to improve outcomes.
• Design and implement repeatable program management standards, frameworks, and operating mechanisms that improve execution quality across the organisation.
• Coach program managers and cross-functional leaders on program management practices, stakeholder alignment, governance design, risk management, and organisational change.
• Partner with Program Management leadership to evolve portfolio management practices, resource planning approaches, staffing models, and program intake processes.
• Facilitate executive-level decision-making by synthesising complex information, framing trade-offs, and providing recommendations on prioritisation, sequencing, and investment.
• Drive turnaround efforts for programmes requiring intervention, including clarifying ownership, resetting plans, rebuilding stakeholder alignment, and restoring execution momentum.
• Identify opportunities to improve organisational effectiveness through better operating models, scalable mechanisms, automation, AI-enabled workflows, and durable systems.
• Build reusable playbooks, templates, frameworks, and knowledge assets that raise the effectiveness of the broader Program Management function.

How You Will Do Your Work

As a Lead Program Manager, how results are achieved is paramount for your success and ultimately result in our success as an organisation. In this role, your foundational knowledge, skills, abilities and personal attributes are anchored in the following competencies:

• Customer focus - builds strong customer relationships and delivers customer-centred solutions.
• Teamwork and communication - putting our collective best together through documentation, collaboration, relationship-building, listening, empathy, recruiting, and evangelism.
• Nimble learning - actively learning through experimentation when tackling new problems, using both successes and failures as learning fodder.
• Results-driven - consistently achieves results, even under difficult circumstances.
• Strategic mindset - anticipates future trends and implications accurately; articulates credible pictures and visions of possibilities that will create sustainable value.
• Detail-oriented - exercises extreme attention to detail; is thorough, accurate, organised, and productive and seeks to understand both the cause and effect of a situation.
• Ethical practice - the ability to integrate core values, integrity, and accountability throughout all organisational and business practices.
• Clear communication - the ability to articulate thoughts and express ideas effectively using oral, written, visual and non-verbal communication skills, as well as listening skills to gain understanding.
• Analytical - uses a logical reasoning process to break down and work through a situation or problem to arrive at an outcome.
• Good judgement - the exercise of critical thinking, analysing and assessing problems and implications, identifying patterns, making connections of underlying issues, understanding risks and developing mitigation strategies, and taking ownership of the outcome.

In addition, all Justworkers focus on aligning their behaviours to our core values known as COGIS. It stands for:

• Camaraderie - Day to day you can be seen working together toward a higher purpose. You like to have fun. You’re an active listener, treat people respectfully, and have a strong desire to know and help others.
• Openness - Your default is to be open. You're willing to share information, understand other perspectives, and consider new possibilities. You’re curious, ask open questions, and are receptive to thoughts and feedback from others.
• Grit - You demonstrate grit by having the courage to commit and persevere. You’re committed, earnest, and dive in to get the job done well with a positive attitude.
• Integrity - Simply put, do what you say and say what you’ll do. You’re honest and forthright, have a strong moral compass, and strive to match your words with your actions while leading by example.
• Simplicity - Be like Einstein: “Everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler.”

Qualifications

• Minimum of 8+ years of experience in strategy, operations, management consulting, program management, product operations, business operations, or a related cross-functional leadership role.
• Demonstrated experience leading highly ambiguous, cross-functional initiatives that span multiple teams, organisations, or business functions.
• Proven ability to translate emerging strategies, executive priorities, or loosely defined opportunities into actionable plans, operating models, and measurable outcomes.
• Strong business acumen with the ability to evaluate organisational trade-offs, investment decisions, operating models, and long-term strategic implications.
• Exceptional systems thinker who can identify patterns, dependencies, organisational friction points, and opportunities for leverage across complex environments.
• Demonstrated ability to influence senior leaders and executive stakeholders without direct authority, driving alignment across competing priorities and perspectives.
• Experience establishing structure where little exists, including defining ownership models, governance mechanisms, decision-making frameworks, and operating rhythms.
• Strong technical fluency and curiosity, with the ability to quickly develop expertise in new domains, technologies, products, and business models.
• Exceptional written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to synthesise complex information into clear recommendations for executive audiences.
• Creative systems thinker who thrives in ambiguity, demonstrates strong judgement, and has a passion for simplifying complexity and accelerating organisational outcomes.

The base wage range for this position based in our New York City Office is targeted at $166,000.00 - $214,000.00 per year.

Actual compensation is based on multiple factors that are unique to each candidate, including and not limited to skill set, level of relevant experience, and specific work location. Salary ranges for positions based in other locations may differ based on the cost of labour in that location.

For more information about Justworks’ Total Reward Philosophy, including all of the perks and benefits we are proud to offer our team members, please visit Total Rewards @ Justworks .

Diversity At Justworks

Justworks is committed to maintaining a workplace where diversity of identity, culture, and life experience is the norm and is celebrated authentically and respected consistently. Diversity in our work, our people, and our product drives creativity and innovation, entrepreneurial leadership and integrity, competitiveness, and collaboration throughout our business and in the market. We depend on our differences to make our team stronger, our workplace more dynamic, and our product accessible to all of our customers.

We’re proud to be an equal opportunity employer open to all qualified applicants regardless of race, colour, ancestry, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, age, citizenship, marital or familial status, disability, pregnancy, gender identity or expression, veteran status, genetic information, or any other legally protected status. Justworks is fully dedicated to providing necessary support to candidates with disabilities who may require reasonable accommodations. We also provide reasonable accommodations to employees based on their sincerely held religious beliefs, as well as for other covered reasons consistent with applicable federal, state, and local laws. If you're in need of a reasonable accommodation, please reach out to us at [e-mail] . Your comfort and success matter to us, and we're here to ensure an inclusive experience.

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Just Be You

We’re committed to building a culture where everyone feels welcome, supported, and empowered to thrive. We believe that a wide range of perspectives, experiences, and identities strengthens our team and helps us create the kind of workplace—and world—we want to see.

We believe that in order to gather accurate demographic information we need to move beyond traditional questions about gender, race and ethnicity, and sexual orientation in favour of more inclusive and open-ended approaches. Of course, thinking around these areas is ever-evolving so, wherever applicable please feel free to select "I prefer to self-describe" and then elaborate so we can use your feedback to inform survey selections in the future.

Participation in this survey is completely optional. Any responses you choose to share will not be associated with your application and will not in any way be used in any hiring decision. We are collecting this information to deepen our understanding of our candidate pool and to continue to foster a welcoming and equitable hiring experience for all.

At Justworks, we are building an open, inclusive, and collaborative culture that values each person’s unique potential. We strive to help every Justworker grow with confidence in the collective service of our company, our community, and our customers.

We know that creating a truly inclusive workplace where everyone thrives is an ongoing journey—one that requires consistency, accountability, and shared commitment. We’re proud of the company we’re building together, one great Justworker at a time.