Technical Project Manager

9-mothers; Austin (TX); On-site; USD 110,000 - 150,000; Full time

Job summary

9 Mothers is seeking a Technical Project Manager to own the work breakdown structure and integrated schedule for hardware and robotics initiatives. You will run weekly coordination, record decisions, and keep the plan legible so leadership can act with real information.

You will stand up project management practices from scratch, choosing lightweight tools and processes that fit a lean R&D team while preventing schedule slips and miscommunication.

Qualifications

• 5+ years of project management experience on complex hardware/robotics programs.
• Engineering degree or hands-on hardware development experience.
• Proven ownership of a WBS and integrated schedule.

Responsibilities

• Build and own WBS across product lines with tasks, owners, durations and dates.
• Maintain the integrated master schedule as single source of truth.
• Identify critical path and flag risks before deadlines.
• Translate commitments into backward-planned schedules with margins.

Skills

Project management

Cross-functional coordination

Hardware understanding

Risk management

Education

Bachelor's degree in Engineering

Tools

Gantt-based scheduling tool

Job description

Location: Onsite - Austin, TX

Employment Type: Direct Hire, Full-Time

Job Title: Technical Project Manager

About 9 Mothers

The modern battlefield has changed. Cheap, autonomous suicide drones have turned the tactical advantage upside down, and the world is looking for a solution. At 9 Mothers, we aren't just "innovating"-we are building the shield.

Backed by top-tier investors, we develop AI powered machines designed to intercept and neutralize Group 1/sUAS threats in real-time. Our flagship product is a low-power, counter-drone system built for the edge-on vehicles, at bases, or in a soldier's pack.

Why 9 Mothers?

While others build for "awareness" or "long-term research," we build for the immediate survival of those in harm's way. We are a team of hackers, engineers, and mission-driven builders who value field-ready capability over polished slide decks. If you want to see your code or hardware in the field next month-not next year-this is your playground.

Position Summary

You will be our first dedicated project manager, and your job is to fix that. You own the work breakdown structure and the integrated schedule. You run the weekly coordination rhythm, record every task and decision so nothing is dropped, and stay ahead of the risks that quietly kill hardware schedules: long-lead parts, manpower shortages and skill gaps, missing equipment and infrastructure. Leadership will continue to set priorities, assign responsibility, and hold people accountable; your job is to make the plan legible and current so those decisions are made with real information, and so every person on the team knows what they need to be doing and when.

This is a role for someone who treats a well-built Gantt chart as a love language. Your best days end with the ambiguity banished from the plan and a name and a date on everything that matters. We are a startup: the process you bring must be the lightweight 20% that delivers 80% of the value, not a bureaucracy the team routes around.

Essential Duties

Schedule & WBS Ownership (Primary)

• Build and own the work breakdown structure across our product lines: decompose engineering, manufacturing, test, and delivery work into tasks with owners, durations, dependencies, and dates
• Build and maintain the integrated master schedule in a Gantt-based tool; keep it current enough that the team and leadership trust it as the single source of truth for what happens when
• Identify and track the critical path; flag slips early and quantify their downstream impact so leadership can re-prioritize before a deadline is blown, not after
• Translate customer commitments, demo dates, and test events into backward-planned schedules with explicit margin

Risk & Dependency Management

• Maintain a living risk register for the things that actually derail hardware programs: long-lead and allocated parts, manpower shortages and skill gaps, missing equipment, tooling, and facility/infrastructure needs
• Chase dependencies across engineering, purchasing, and the shop: surface the part that isn't ordered, the fixture that isn't built, and the test range that isn't booked while there is still time to fix it
• Work with the buyer on long-lead procurement timing so build schedules are planned around real lead times, and with leadership on staffing gaps before they become schedule slips

Coordination, Tasking & Communication

• Run the weekly coordination meeting: set the agenda, drive it to decisions, and finish with every action item recorded with an owner and a due date
• Be the recorder of tasking for the company: capture tasks and decisions from meetings, hallway conversations, and test events into one tracked system so nothing is missed or forgotten
• Follow up on open actions between meetings; keep status honest without becoming the person the team hides from
• Give leadership a clear, current picture of status, risks, and upcoming decisions that is short, factual, and free of surprises

Building the Structure

• Stand up the company's project management practices from scratch: task tracking, schedule reviews, action-item discipline, and deliverable definitions where none formally exist today
• Select and administer the scheduling and task-tracking tools the company will run on, sized for a lean team: powerful enough to be trusted, light enough to be used
• Establish just enough process to bring order to tasking and project planning without slowing a fast-iterating R&D team

Requirements

• 5+ years of project management experience on complex hardware / electromechanical development programs in robotics, defense, aerospace, automotive, industrial equipment, or similar
• Technical background: an engineering degree or hands-on engineering experience on hardware products. You must be able to follow a technical discussion, ask credible questions, and earn the respect of a senior engineering team
• Demonstrated ownership of a WBS and integrated schedule on a multi-disciplinary program: you built and ran the plan, not just reported on it