Senior Program Manager, R&D Talent Programs

United States Digital Space LLC; Boston (MA); Hybrid; USD 120,000 - 245,000; Full time

Job summary

United States Digital Space LLC in Boston, MA seeks a Senior Program Manager, R&D Talent Programs to own end-to-end Product/Design talent programs, from strategy to cohort experience, in collaboration with Early Careers and Recruitment.

You will start with our Product internship program and scale future talent initiatives across Design and wider R&D, building headcount plans, timelines, evaluation bars, and intern experiences with leadership oversight.

Qualifications

• 7+ years of relevant experience across talent programs, early careers or university recruiting, program management, or R&D/Product Operations.
• Track record of building and growing a talent program and scaling it.
• University, MBA, or early-career recruiting experience strongly preferred.
• Exceptional program management with multiple parallel workstreams and deadlines.
• Ability to influence without authority and hold stakeholders to commitments.
• Sound judgment on talent evaluation and calibration across diverse work.
• Outstanding written and verbal communication; clear for interns to executives.

Responsibilities

• Own the Product and Design talent program end to end—strategy, structure, cohort experience, and stakeholder alignment.
• Collaborate with Early Careers and Recruitment to manage university partnerships and candidate sourcing.
• Design and build internship programs, and scale into broader talent programs across R&D.
• Secure headcount, establish timelines, design evaluation bars, and define intern experiences.
• Partner with People Success, Finance, Compensation, and Product/Design leadership.
• Run end-of-cycle retrospectives and translate learnings into next-year plans.
• Embrace AI tools to accelerate product discovery and execution.

Skills

Program management

Stakeholder management

Talent programs

Early-career recruiting

Education

MBA / University recruiting

Tools

AI tools usage

Job description

Location: Boston, MA - Hybrid position

the company creates technology to help restaurants and local businesses succeed in a digital world, helping business owners operate, increase sales, engage customers, and keep employees happy.

As Senior Program Manager, R&D Talent Programs, you will own the Product/Design talent program end to end—strategy, structure, cohort experience, and stakeholder alignment—serving as the primary point of contact and the planner who builds the cohorts that become the next generation of the company's Product and Design leadership. In this role, you will collaborate closely with the Early Careers team, who manages university partnerships and the talent pipeline, as well as the Recruitment team, who oversees candidate sourcing and requisition management.

Our Product internship program is where you'll start. As that program matures, you will design and build the talent programs that come next—extending to Design and the wider set of programs that develop talent across R&D. This is a role with room to define its own scope over time.

This role is ideal for someone who has built a talent program. You will set strategy alongside Product & Design leadership, then do the work that makes strategy real: securing headcount, establishing timelines, designing an evaluation bar, and creating an intern experience good enough that the best candidates say yes. You will work in close partnership with People Success Partners, Early Careers, Recruitment, Finance, Compensation, and Product/Design leadership.

This role sits within the R&D Operations team at the company - we are on a mission to empower our teams to build great products efficiently, effectively, and at scale. We remove obstacles, foster alignment, and help teams focus on what matters most—solving real problems for our customers. We also play a central role in building the talent pipeline for the future.

A day in the life (Responsibilities)

• Own the Product and Design program side of our internship and early-career programs —program design, structure, timeline, deliverables, communications, and intern experience once candidates are in the pipeline (sourcing, screening, and requisition-to-offer recruiting mechanics sit with Early Careers and Recruitment). Build a structure for managers to determine internship projects and team placements.

• Size and secure intern headcount each cycle, and partner with Early Careers/Recruitment to ensure hiring plans, timelines, and evaluation criteria set them up for success.

• Build world-class programming - including onboarding, an executive speaker series, intern showcase and capstone presentations, and cohort culture and community.

• Design the conversion process, including the evaluation frameworks, compensation packages, and “sell” experience.

• Keep stakeholders aligned and informed, from intern managers to leaders, on program direction, level, budget, and placement.

• Represent Product at university partner engagements and campus events set up by Early Careers. Partner with Recruitment to source market intelligence to keep our process and our offers competitive.

• Run end-of-cycle retrospectives and translate them into the following year's plan, growing this from a single-cohort program into a durable, multi-function leadership pipeline for the company.

• Design and build new talent programs over time—identifying where R&D's biggest talent gaps are, making the case for a program to address them, and standing it up from a blank page.

• Embrace and advocate for the use of AI tools to accelerate product discovery, streamline execution, and explore new product experiences - helping shape how we build and what we build.

What you'll need to thrive (Requirements)

• 7+ years of relevant experience across talent programs, early career or university recruiting, program management, or R&D/Product Operations.

• A track record of building and growing a talent program—you have stood something up and scaled it.

• University, MBA, or early-career recruiting experience strongly preferred, including familiarity with campus recruiting calendars and competitive dynamics.

• Exceptional program management: you can hold many parallel workstreams, stakeholders, and hard external deadlines without dropping any of them.

• Proven ability to influence without authority—briefing executives, holding senior managers to commitments, and absorbing pushback while keeping the program on track.

• Sound judgment on talent, with the ability to build and steward an evaluation bar and calibrate fairly across dissimilar work.

• Outstanding written and verbal communication; you distill complexity into clarity for audiences from interns to the executive team.

• Genuine energy for early-career talent. For many candidates, you are their first and most lasting impression of the company.

• Based in Boston and able to be onsite regularly, since the cohort experience and campus engagements happen in person.

AI at the company

At the company, one of our company values is that we're hungry to build and learn. We believe learning new AI tools empowers us to build for our customers faster, more independently, and with higher quality. We provide these tools across all disciplines, from Engineering and Product to Sales and Support, and are inspired by how our Toasters are already driving real value with them. The people who thrive here are those who embrace changes that let us build more for our customers; it’s a core part of our culture.

Our Total Rewards Philosophy

We strive to provide competitive compensation and benefits programs that help to attract, retain, and motivate the best and brightest people in our industry. Our total rewards package goes beyond great earnings potential and provides the means to a healthy lifestyle with the flexibility to meet Toasters’ changing needs. Learn more about our benefits at https://careers.toasttab.com/the company-benefits.

The base salary range for this role is listed below. The starting salary will be determined based on skills, experience, and geographic location. In addition to base salary, our total rewards components include cash compensation (overtime, bonus/commissions if eligible), equity, and benefits. You can learn more about how we align pay with local labor markets in our Geographic Pay Zone Philosophy.

Zone A

$153,000—$245,000 USD

Zone B

$133,000—$213,000 USD

Zone C

$120,000—$192,000 USD

How the company Uses AI in its Hiring Process

Throughout the hiring process, our goal is to get to know you. We use AI tools to support our recruiters and interviewers with tasks like note-taking, summarization, and documentation of interviews to ensure they can be fully focused on your conversation. All hiring decisions are made by people. We ask that you complete interviews and assessments on your own, without real-time AI tools, recording, or transcription bots, unl