Technical Program Manager

About Us

• We’re transforming the Department of Defense and we know that takes a dream team.
• We believe customer experience starts with employee experience, so we take care of our employees.
• We offer competitive pay and benefits, invest in employee growth, and offer a culture you can’t find anywhere else. 
• At Rise8, we continuously achieve unreached heights through next-level tech, and on-the-level collaboration. Together, we create continuous impact. We help teams turn breakdowns into breakthroughs, make small steps into giant leaps, and deliver game-changing products through culture-changing process.
• We pair Risers with their customer counterparts and practice pairing at every moment to elevate people and teams and deliver results fast and forever. 
• We work in small teams and rotate between them frequently so that we are able to meet new challenges and explore new ideas.
• Our methodology is about evolving, in both development and innovation, and our culture is empowering. We subscribe to an ethos of kindness. We make a point to bring empathy to each and every project and are guided by a purposeful mission: to continuously deliver impactful software that users love.
• Rise8 is certified as a Great Place to Work with 100% of employees saying they love working here.

Role overview

Rise8 is hiring a Technical Program Manager to lead coordination and delivery for cross-functional, mission-critical internal programs. This role prioritizes program planning, stakeholder alignment, risk management, and ensuring work ships to production with measurable mission impact. You’ll be the glue across Product, Engineering, Security, Employee Tools & Services (ETS), and customer stakeholders — owning program execution and the governance around our GitLab backlog/roadmap tooling (initial 6-month focus), then owning the internal site program and ETS-aligned initiatives long-term.

This is a remote, U.S.-based position supporting GovCon customers and internal tooling. Clearance preferred.

Why this role matters

TPMs at Rise8 ensure teams move quickly and safely from idea to capability by translating mission outcomes into executable delivery plans, surfacing and resolving cross-team dependencies, and making production the arbiter of truth. This role is about coordination, governance, and delivering outcomes — not hands-on engineering.

Key responsibilities

• Own end-to-end program coordination and delivery for assigned portfolios, including the GitLab backlog rollout (initial 6 months) and the internal site thereafter.
• Define and enforce governance for backlog & roadmap artifacts in GitLab (templates, epics, naming conventions, permissions, milestone cadences).
• Coordinate across internal stakeholders (Product, Engineering, ETS, Security, People Ops, Finance) to prioritize the backlog, manage dependencies, and align on milestones.
• Partner with GitLab support engineer(s) and ETS to resolve platform issues, implement integrations, and support onboarding/training.
• Run program-level ceremonies: PI planning, program syncs, backlog grooming, release readiness, and post-release reviews.
• Create and maintain program dashboards (velocity, milestone burn-down, blocked items, production outcomes).
• Drive adoption via training, playbooks, office hours, and documentation so GitLab serves as our canonical backlog tool (not an engineering deployment policy).
• Manage risk, issues, and escalation paths; run blameless retros and ensure action items close.
• Own handoff and transition plans so ETS assumes maintenance while you retain product roadmap ownership.
• When GitLab workload is light, lead internal ETS projects and continuous improvement initiatives.
  
  

Required qualifications

• 5+ years delivering cross-functional technical programs, tool rollouts, or portfolio-level programs.
• Hands-on experience with GitLab (epics, issue boards, milestones, roadmaps) or equivalent portfolio tooling.
• Proven stakeholder management: ability to align multiple business and technical owners and to communicate across departments.
• Strong process, governance, and change-management skills (templates, permissions, adoption playbooks).
• Technical fluency to engage with engineers, DevSecOps, and platform support without being the implementer.
• Excellent written and verbal communication for training materials, runbooks, and executive updates.
• U.S. work authorization required; clearance preferred or ability to obtain.
  
  

Preferred qualifications

• Experience transitioning tool ownership to IT/platform teams.
• Prior GovCon or DoD program experience (CUI handling, DFARS/NIST familiarity).
• Experience with observability/telemetry and program-level KPIs.

Benefits 

• Flexible schedule in a 100% distributed workforce 
• Premium Insurance: We cover up to 100% of the employee premium and up to 80% of the combined dependent premium on our base health plan, depending on pay band. We also cover 100% of the premium for employee and dependent Dental and Vision as well as employee premiums for Life and Disability coverage.
• Retirement: 401k match at 10% gross pay.
• Paid time off (PTO): 4 weeks combined accrued vacation and sick leave, 11 Federal holidays, your birthday, jury duty, and bereavement.
• Education & Training: Accrued budget of up to $3,500 per year for classes, travel, events, and materials.
• Home Office and Merch: We offer $750 per year for home office technology and equipment as well as $100 per year for Rise8 merch from our Swag Store.
• Wellness Budget: To encourage and support a well-rounded healthy lifestyle, we cover 100% reimbursement on a variety of wellness activities and products, up to $500 per calendar year. Or Rise8 is part of the the Life Time Corporate Partner program. In lieu of your $500 annual wellness benefit, you can instead get a $75 monthly credit towards a Life Time membership ($900 annual benefit).
• Equipment: We offer a MacBook Pro