Spear is one of the world’s most respected providers of continuing education and support to dentists and their teams, helping them pursue and achieve great dentistry. Spear leads the way with an exceptional curriculum, inspired faculty and on-demand learning.

Objective:

As Director, Product you will be responsible for all aspects of the product management process from strategy to the proper execution of products for one of Spear Education’s core business units.  This includes increasing the profitability of existing products, evolving existing offerings, and helping to develop new ideas based on strategic guidance from executive leaders and your contact with customers and prospects.

A Director, Product key role is both strategic and tactical as you help drive the overall business unit performance while working collaboratively with other functional areas to ensure KPI’s are being met and periodic tasks are completed to an exceptional standard.

Who We’re Looking For

You must possess a unique blend of business and technical savvy; a big-picture vision, and the drive to make that vision a reality. You must enjoy spending time in the market to understand their problems, and find innovative solutions for the broader market. 

Role Snapshot

Proper alignment of finance, product strategy, and sales is crucial for the success of our products. You must be able to lead cross functional teams as you will work with all areas of the company. From collaborating with leadership to define product release requirements, doing market analysis (sizing and price), determining ROI, conducting Win/Loss analysis, partnering with marketing communications to define the go-to-market strategy, helping all stakeholders to understand the product positioning, key benefits, and target customer. You will also serve as the internal and external evangelist for your product offering, working closely with the sales leaders to ensure a continuous execution feedback loop.

Day to Day

• Work collaboratively with the Executive Team to identify the critical goals for the product
• Collaborate and lead launches of the product platform that meets senior leadership guidance and customer expectations
• Establish processes which lead to effective management of product life cycle from market needs prioritization, conceptual design, to user experience guidance. 
• Demonstrated ability to create and utilize product experience maps to define product feature sets and impact on overall user experience.
• Establish critical measurement metrics (KPI’s) to effectively manage and monitor the implementation and growth of the product offering
• Demonstrate clear cross functional leadership among the other key contributors to ensure successful product growth and financial performance
• Clearly communicate and lead product changes based on customer, sales and marketing feedback to ensure customer retention >85% on an annual basis
• Work closely with technical development team to ensure product functionality meets customer expectations and issues are resolved in a timely manner

Expected Outcomes:

1. Collaborate with VP of Customer Success to co-create a formalized, scalable “Consulting Framework” used by Spear Practice Solutions that enables consistent, high quality delivery of services by Consultants commensurate with a 90%+ retention rate and at a 30:1 client to consultant ratio capability by the end of 2017
   
2. Iterate and evolve existing components of Spear Practice Solutions Analytics Platform 
   
3. Design the future state of Product Development for Spear Practice Solutions including structure, governance protocols, performance management systems, feedback loops. Propose timing of hiring schedule. Ensure strong cross functional connectivity.
   
4. Build and lead an effective Product team.

• Possesses Bachelor's Degree
• 5-7 years of experience in a similar role
• Knowledgeable and accustomed to work with Agile Methodologies
• Project Management and Software Development experience
• Experience building and leading a team of A players

WORK ENVIRONMENT

• Office environment, normal noise levels, comfortable temperature, no extreme conditions.
• Professional attire required.
• A personal vehicle is necessary for this position as excursions to local vendors will be required on a regular basis (lunch runs, trips to bank or offsite meetings)

PHYSICAL REQUIREMENTS

• Please note that the above statement is intended to describe the general nature and level of work being performed by people assigned to this position. It is not to be construed as an exhaustive list of all responsibilities, duties and skills required of personnel in this position. 
• All personnel may be required to perform duties outside of their normal responsibilities from time to time as needed and a position’s duties & responsibilities may change over time as workflow necessitates.

EEO

• All your information will be kept confidential according to EEO guidelines.