Principal Product Manager (Project Management)

At F5, we strive to bring a better digital world to life. Our teams empower organizations across the globe to create, secure, and run applications that enhance how we experience our evolving digital world. We are passionate about cybersecurity, from protecting consumers from fraud to enabling companies to focus on innovation. 
 

Everything we do centers around people. That means we obsess over how to make the lives of our customers, and their customers, better. And it means we prioritize a diverse F5 community where each individual can thrive.

Company description

F5 is a leading provider of multi-cloud application services, which enable our customers to develop, deploy, operate, secure, and govern applications in any architecture, from on-premises to the public cloud. Our cloud, software, and hardware solutions enable our customers to deliver digital experiences to their customers faster, reliably, and at scale. For F5, it is not just what we do but also how we do it. In fact, creating a culture that makes our employees feel valued and successful is a core part of our strategy and we are deliberately working to build a more agile and inclusive F5. We believe our differences – when embraced with humility and respect – drive smarter decisions, increased innovation, and stronger performance.

POSITION SUMMARY

The Principal of Product Management, is responsible for driving the vision and direction of BIG-IP LTM. This role will work cross-functionally across the broader BIG-IP team and product management team. Success in this role will require insight into market trends, customer needs, and understanding how BIG-IP can be applied to novel technical challenges along with partners as part of a full solution (e.g., AI Data Delivery, AI Enterprise Firewall, Top of Rack hardware). Analysis will include competitive positioning for BIG-IP and What it takes to win, market and business performance signals for forecasting 1 & 5 year business performance. In addition, this role will be responsible for driving intra and inter BIG-IP product management communications with key stake holders (e.g., product management, engineering and other functions).

You will work collaboratively and drive strategic alignment within the organization. You must have the ability to communicate effectively with F5 product teams, F5 customers, and F5 partners. Your team will develop strategic initiatives using a balance of future vision, near-term opportunities, customer requirements, business expertise, and expression of day-to-day product issues. The position is dynamic and multifaceted: success will be driven by becoming comfortable with frequent multi-tasking among technical, business, strategic and planning activities.

Primary Responsibilities

· Produce product requirements and corresponding business cases for new or evolving BIG-IP products.

· Drive the execution of all processes in the product lifecycle, including product concept, make vs. buy analysis, design requirements, New Product Introduction (NPI), flagship product, cash cow, sunset, and End-of-Life (EOL)

· Maintain stewardship of the BIG-IP roadmap for LTM and related BIG-IP capabilities.

· Independently lead large projects (individual or with cross-functional team) to develop a factbase and set of recommendations to provide into a strategic question or business problem (e.g., new product entry)

· Apply an 80/20 approach to create structured models leveraging data from across sources (e.g., Capital IQ, 3rd party analyst insights, survey data) for 1 & 5 year financial planning

· Use appropriate storylining and storytelling techniques to communicate recommendations or insights to an identified audience (e.g., the Board, the CEO or Executive Leadership team, Product Management leadership, or broad set of employees)

· Apply business acumen to synthesize findings to develop strategic recommendations

· Establish external relationships with industry analysts to build F5 credibility

· Support and coach Product Management leaders to test prospective F5 strategies

· Influence without authority to ensure strategic recommendations are executed by the business

· Proactively identify and manage impact of insights to broader organization, including development and presentation of a strategic point of view, goals, and proposed outcomes

· Facilitate large scale meetings and workshops, including preparation and driving tangible outcomes

· Assist senior business executives in framing, evaluating, and executing against strategic options

· Direct and manage team members to successfully complete product line/program strategy, establish measurable goals and objectives that meet strategic goals

· Formulate innovative use of F5 product functions and open-source software tools to solve operational problems faced by F5 Customers.

· Develop timely market insights including competitive analysis and user insights for informed decision making to drive product strategies and ensure product market fit.

· Participate in product innovation projects and proof-of-concept initiatives, including research of product requirements to facilitate proactive maintenance and/or outage mitigation.

· Partner with marketing, engineering, services, sales, and customers to drive product direction for F5's products, including Buy, Build, or Partner solution delivery.

Knowledge, Skills and Abilities

· Strong customer orientation with the ability to listen, organize and champion key initiatives and projects for product/solution development

· Experience identifying, evaluating and analyzing critical strategic questions and business situations

· Outstanding record of sound business judgment and advice to senior leaders

· Highly focused on execution and delivering high-quality, synthesized analysis

· Demonstrates leadership and the ability to influence by initiating partnerships that promote organizational objectives and change

· Strong written and oral communication skills, with ability to articulate complex technology clearly

· Flexible, self-motivated, collaborative

· Ability to work independently or lead others on projects

· Excellent leadership, interpersonal & persuasion skills

Qualifications

· BA/BS degree in relevant field required, MBA a plus

· 5+ years of experience in product management or equivalent is a must

Skills

· Modeling with Excel

· Communications: Storylining and Storytelling in Powerpoint with Think-cell or 6-page narratives

· Deep structured interviews

The Job Description is intended to be a general representation of the responsibilities and requirements of the job. However, the description may not be all-inclusive, and responsibilities and requirements are subject to change.

The annual base pay for this position is: $179,200.00 - $268,800.00

F5 maintains broad salary ranges for its roles in order to account for variations in knowledge, skills, experience, geographic locations, and market conditions, as well as to reflect F5's differing products, industries, and lines of business. The pay range referenced is as of the time of the job posting and is subject to change.

You may also be offered incentive compensation, bonus, restricted stock units, and benefits. More details about F5's benefits can be found at the following link: https://www.f5.com/company/careers/benefits. F5 reserves the right to change or terminate any benefit plan without notice. 

Please note that F5 only contacts candidates through F5 email address (ending with @f5.com) or auto email notification from Workday (ending with f5.com or @myworkday.com).

Equal Employment Opportunity

It is the policy of F5 to provide equal employment opportunities to all employees and employment applicants without regard to unlawful considerations of race, religion, color, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, sensory, physical, or mental disability, marital status, veteran or military status, genetic information, or any other classification protected by applicable local, state, or federal laws. This policy applies to all aspects of employment, including, but not limited to, hiring, job assignment, compensation, promotion, benefits, training, discipline, and termination.  F5 offers a variety of reasonable accommodations for candidates. Requesting an accommodation is completely voluntary. F5 will assess the need for accommodations in the application process separately from those that may be needed to perform the job. Request by contacting accommodations@f5.com.