Product Delivery Lead

Critical Propulsion; Northern (KY); Hybrid; USD 90,000 - 140,000; Full time

Job summary

Critical Propulsion seeks a product-oriented delivery lead who can transform client problems into a cross-cycle roadmap built by a swarm. You’ll own the backlog, write precise specs, and steer the team using Amplify’s cadence.

You’ll collaborate with clients directly and coordinate AI-assisted research, scoping, and documentation to ensure real outcomes align with business goals. You’ll balance product thinking with delivery constraints, shipping tangible value within short Pulse cycles, while

Qualifications

• Experience collaborating with clients to translate problems into actionable roadmaps.
• Ability to scope and prioritize deliverables across multiple cycles.
• Strong UX judgment and product sense.

Responsibilities

• Own the product backlog and roadmap, ensuring alignment with client problems and Pulse cycles.
• Write specs before the swarm starts building to minimize rework.
• Run backlog banding, release gates, and live reporting inside Amplify.
• Communicate directly with clients to align outcomes with what the product needs to do.
• Leverage AI agents to accelerate research, scoping, and documentation.
• Think in product terms, planning beyond the current cycle to future cycles.

Job description

What you’ll own

The product. You turn a client's problem into a roadmap a swarm can build against, one Pulse cycle at a time. Part product owner, part delivery lead: you're the reason the swarm builds the right thing, not just the thing that was asked for three weeks ago. You bring UX judgment to the table too.

Most places that combine these functions don't say so upfront. We do. If you've carried half this title somewhere else, expect to run both halves here, not slide into one and let the other slip.

How we build

Critical Propulsion pairs senior consultants with AI agents inside Amplify, our agentic delivery framework, to build products in 5-day Pulse cycles. Consultants own the judgment: what to build, what ships, which gate a release has to clear. Agents handle the volume: code generation, testing, the repeatable work a team of ten used to grind through.

Some engagements close out at delivery. Others keep going, the swarm shipping against a live roadmap cycle after cycle. Either way, week 1 is working product, not onboarding.

What we expect

You band the backlog into outcomes a swarm can build in a single Pulse cycle. If a deliverable can't ship in 5 days, you break it down until it can.

You write specs before the swarm starts building. A well-scoped spec is the difference between shipping in one cycle and burning two on rework.

You run the cadence inside Amplify: backlog banding, release gates, live reporting. You remove blockers and keep the swarm pointed at the outcome that matters this cycle.

You talk to the client directly and often. You close the gap between what they asked for and what the product actually needs to do.

You embrace agentic development. You use AI agents to accelerate research, scoping, and documentation. This is how delivery gets run now.

You think in product terms: not just this cycle's ask, but whether what ships this week still makes sense three cycles from now.

You catch UX friction before it ships, even if your title doesn't say “designer.”

You communicate directly. No status theater. No 40-slide readout that could be a 3-line message.

What we don't filter on

• Whether your background is “PM,” “PdM,” “BA,” “UX,” or “consultant.” We care about whether you can own a product and keep a swarm pointed at the right outcomes.
• Years of experience as a number. If you can run the cadence for a swarm shipping a product in 5-day Pulse cycles, the number is irrelevant.
• No school, company name, or certification substitutes for demonstrated ability to scope, prioritize, and ship.

Nice to have

• Experience writing specs an engineering team can build from without ambiguity. You've seen how spec-driven design cuts rework.
• Familiarity with Azure cloud services, enough to have an informed conversation with architects and engineers about what's feasible.
• Working knowledge of Python, Node.js, React, or TypeScript. You don't need to write production code, but you understand what the swarm is building well enough to scope it accurately.
• Hands-on experience with agentic AI tooling: Claude Code, Cursor, Copilot Workspace, or similar, to draft specs, synthesize research, or accelerate planning.
• Background managing client expectations, navigating scope changes, and shipping under real constraints with real stakeholders watching.
• Prior experience on small, autonomous teams. You've run delivery for a 3-4 person crew, not managed a backlog for a 15-person feature factory.
• UX sensibility: usability reviews, wireframes, or product decisions shaped by how real users interact with software.

What you get

• A team where everyone builds. No layers of management between you and the work.
• AI agents as real teammates inside Amplify. You'll use them to accelerate scoping, research, and documentation.
• Pulse cycles that create rhythm without sprint overhead (KT +75%, Rework +60%, Mgmt +45% in typical sprint models).
• Product impact you can see. The outcomes you scope ship in days, and the roadmap shows whether they were the right call.
• Competitive comp