NPD Project Manager - Product Launch Leader

Bradford White; Rochester (NH); On-site; USD 90,000 - 120,000; Full time

Job summary

Laars Heating Systems Company seeks an experienced NPD Project Manager to lead end-to-end new product development from stage-gate evaluation to launch. You will guide cross-functional teams with discipline, aligning scope, schedule, budget, quality, and readiness.

This leadership role emphasizes structure, accountability, and proactive risk management. You will coordinate across Manufacturing, Engineering, Purchasing, Product Management, Finance, Supply Chain, Sales, and Marketing to deliver on

Qualifications

• 5+ years of project management experience leading cross-functional product development or engineering programs.
• Experience managing projects through a formal stage-gate NPD process from concept through commercialization.
• Proven ability to lead without direct authority, influence diverse stakeholders, and hold teams accountable.
• Strong command of scope management, integrated scheduling, resource planning, risk management, budget tracking, meeting facilitation, decision documentation, and escalation practices.
• Experience with MS Project, Smartsheet, Jira, or equivalent and Microsoft Office tools.

Responsibilities

• Own NPD programs from stage-gate evaluation through launch and production handoff, maintaining integrated plans, schedules, milestones, resource needs, risks, budgets, and deliverables.
• Lead phase-gate reviews, maintain a single accurate view of project status, and drive timely resolution of open issues, resource gaps, scope conflicts, and schedule risks.
• Facilitate cross-functional teams by aligning diverse functions around priorities, decision points, action items, accountability, and a shared definition of done.
• Monitor team engagement, coach project discipline, encourage transparency, and intervene constructively when behaviors or missed commitments put the project at risk.
• Identify, assess, and actively manage risks and issues throughout the project lifecycle, developing mitigation and contingency plans with functional leads.
• Escalate risks, resource gaps, technical delays, and scope changes with context, options, and clear asks so leadership can make timely decisions.
• Serve as the integration point across Manufacturing, Product Engineering, Purchasing, Product Management, Finance, Supply Chain, Sales, and Marketing, ensuring dependencies are understood and managed.
• Coordinate cadence meetings, design milestones, prototype builds, sourcing/tooling readiness, production readiness, budget tracking, leadership updates, and stakeholder communications.
• Execute projects within the company’s NPD stage-gate process while adapting tools and methods to program realities.
• Maintain complete project documentation and identify improvements to NPD tools, templates, and processes based on lessons learned.

Skills

Project management

Cross-functional leadership

Risk management

Stakeholder influence

Communication

Education

Bachelor's degree in PM/Engineering/Business

PMP certification

Tools

MS Project

Smartsheet

Jira

Microsoft Office

Job description

Laars Heating Systems Company seeks an experienced NPD Project Manager to lead end-to-end new product development from stage-gate evaluation to launch. You will guide cross-functional teams with discipline, aligning scope, schedule, budget, quality, and readiness.

This leadership role emphasizes structure, accountability, and proactive risk management. You will coordinate across Manufacturing, Engineering, Purchasing, Product Management, Finance, Supply Chain, Sales, and Marketing to deliver on