Principal Product Manager

Esper; Austin (TX); On-site; USD 80,000 - 120,000; Full time

Job summary

Esper is seeking a product role that focuses on building innovative solutions for government entities. You will work closely with customers to develop a deep understanding of their needs, partner with engineering to deliver scalable products, and maintain feedback loops to ensure value. Ideal candidates possess deep product ownership, technical fluency, and a strong customer-centric approach. The role promises both challenge and reward in a fast-paced environment striving for continuous improvement.

Qualifications

• You understand the system and its constraints.
• You experiment and learn from failures quickly.
• You can engage credibly with engineers.

Responsibilities

• Develop deep product intuition by meeting with customers.
• Partner closely with engineering to design scalable products.
• Translate customer needs into clear product direction.
• Engage directly with customers to uncover pain points.

Skills

Product ownership

Technical fluency

Strong communication

High organization

AI usage in workflows

Job description

About the Role

This is the ideal role for people who want to build things that matter and bring innovation to one of the oldest and most under‑served entities in the market: our government. Esper’s customers include some of the largest police departments and state agencies in America, and they rely on our platform for critical policy and regulatory decisions.

This high‑impact role sits at the nexus of Esper. You’ll collaborate with our strong engineering team, meet with customers, and gather feedback from the market to propel our ambitious vision for government forward. You’re comfortable switching between technically complex meetings and sales feedback calls with ease.

With so many inputs, it’s important for this role to find signal through the noise and be a fantastic communicator both internally and to our customers. You’re excellent at prioritizing, pivoting when needed, and, most importantly, maintaining feedback loops throughout the company on what we are building and why it matters.

Make no mistake, this is a role with equal measure responsibility and reward. Keep reading if this description energizes you.

What You’ll Do

• Develop deep product intuition by meeting with our customers and understanding the technical parts of our product. You’re obsessive about how our customers use the product, its break points, and how we can make it better.
• Partner closely with engineering to design and ship thoughtful, scalable products that solve real customer problems
• Own the end to end product lifecycle, paying special attention to the last mile of getting products into customers hands
• Translate customer needs into clear product direction and prioritized roadmaps
• Engage directly with customers. Ask sharp questions, uncover pain points, and communicate value effectively
• Bring structure and organization to fast‑moving, ambiguous problems. People rely on you to synthesize information and communicate a plan.
• Leverage AI tools meaningfully in your day‑to‑day work to move faster and make better decisions

What We’re Looking For

• Deep product ownership: You understand the system, its constraints, and how it behaves in the real world
• Action oriented: You experiment, take action, fail fast and learn.
• Highly organized operator: You track details, follow through, and don’t let important things slip
• Technical fluency: You’re comfortable with complex systems and concepts like domain‑driven design, and can engage credibly with engineers
• Customer credibility: You’re confident in front of customers, ask thoughtful questions, and can clearly articulate product value
• Strong communicator: You can seamlessly switch between technical depth and clear, high‑level storytelling
• AI-native mindset: You actively use AI in your workflows and can point to concrete ways it improves your output

What Success Looks Like

• We ship in fast, iterative cycles. Consistently delivering high‑quality improvements that customers notice and value
• The roadmap is clear and internalized. Teams can confidently and consistently communicate what’s coming next to customers and prospects
• Everything we build has a clear throughline to customer growth and retention, with impact that’s easy to point to and understand