Staff/Principal Engagement Manager

About Skylight

Skylight is a digital consultancy using design and technology to help government agencies deliver better public services.

We’re at the forefront of a civic movement to reinvent how all levels of government serve families, patients, and many others in today's digital world.

If you want to play a part in driving this critical movement forward, we’d love for you to join our growing team of public interest technologists.

The work we do matters.

About the job

At Skylight, engagement managers are responsible for driving the overall success of our client work. They draw on their expertise in areas such as  product management practices, agile coaching at the organizational and team levels,, risk/issue management, stakeholder management, continual improvement, and contract administration in order to deliver the highest levels of client service and work.

You’ll own the product strategy and roadmap for the work, and you’ll also serve as the engagement manager — accountable for the overall success of the contract, the health of the team, and the relationship with our client. This is a technical product role: you’ll work closely with engineers on architecture, integrations, and the secure data exchanges, and you’ll be comfortable making informed tradeoffs about technical feasibility, sequencing, and risk. You’ll set direction in partnership with the agency, assemble and support a multidisciplinary team, navigate the privacy and security realities of working with federal information, and keep delivery moving against federal milestones. This is a senior leadership role for someone who can hold the “what to build and why,” the “how it’s built,” and the “how this engagement succeeds” in the same hand.

What you’ll do

• Lead a cross-functional team of researchers, designers, and engineers to build and ship high-impact products and services


• Translate needs from users and government partners into a product strategy, including vision, objectives, measures of success, product roadmap, and product backlog


• Own the overall success of the engagement as the engagement manager — managing scope, risk, contract health, and the relationship the client


• Partner closely with engineers on architecture, integrations, and the secure data exchanges, making informed tradeoffs about technical feasibility, sequencing, and risk


• Build and support a healthy, psychologically safe team, and coach individuals through the ambiguity and complexity that come with government work


• Creatively navigate bureaucratic and compliance challenges — including the privacy and security realities of federal tax information — to keep delivery moving

What we're looking for

Minimum qualifications

• Understand lean product principles and how to apply them across the product life cycle to mitigate risk, validate assumptions, and amplify learning


• Can develop a product strategy informed by the problem to be solved, prioritizing outcomes over feature sets, and establish the direction of the product over time


• Ability to execute a product strategy by breaking scope into usable chunks of value, maintaining a prioritized backlog of validated user stories, and facilitating team ceremonies


• Ability to manage clients and stakeholders in a way that builds trust, alignment, and healthy environments for individuals and teams


• Ability to lead and grow an engagement as an engagement manager — including agile program management, contract health, risk and issue management, and team health


• Technical fluency sufficient to partner with engineers on architecture, APIs and integrations, and security and compliance tradeoffs, and to translate between technical and non-technical audiences


• Experience setting direction and standards across multiple workstreams or teams, and coaching other practitioners (principal level)


• Ability to work successfully within a professional services environment (e.g., can communicate effectively with clients)


• Passionate about creating better public outcomes through great government services


• A mindset and work approach that aligns with our core values


• Ability to travel for work from time to time

Nice-to-have qualifications

• Experience leading product work on services that handle sensitive personal data (e.g., tax, financial, or benefits information)


• Hands-on or prior engineering background, or experience as a technical product manager working closely with engineering teams


• Experience growing engagements through business development on a professional services or consulting team


• Prior experience working in the civic tech space


• Experience working in a remote-team environment

Don’t meet every qualification but think you can do the job? We’d still love to hear from you. If you’re excited about the role, apply. We consider candidates with a range of backgrounds and experiences.

Other requirements

• All work must be conducted within the U.S., excluding U.S. territories.


• You must be legally authorized to work in the U.S. now and in the future without sponsorship.


• As a government contractor, you may be required to obtain a public trust or security clearance.


• You must complete a company background check successfully.


• Some of our available roles are on federal contracts that require a degree or additional years of experience as a substitute.

Position type

This is a full-time, exempt position.

Location

This is a fully remote position.

Care package

Salary

We want to give you the most competitive salary possible. After all, you deserve it! To that end, we use the results of our interview process to determine what salary is most appropriate given your current level of seniority. For an Engagement Manager at Skylight, the current salary ranges are as follows:

• Associate Engagement Manager: $90,000–$125,000


• Engagement Manager I: $120,000–$140,000


• Engagement Manager II: $135,000–$160,000


• Senior Engagement Manager: $150,000–$185,000


• Staff Engagement Manager: $170,000–$203,000


• Principal Engagement Manager: $180,000–$230,000

Benefits

Your well-being is important to us, so we focus on supporting you in a variety of ways:

• Medical insurance, dental insurance, vision insurance


• Short-term and long-term disability insurance


• Life and AD&D insurance


• Dependent care FSA, healthcare FSA, health savings account


• Dollar-for-dollar 401(k) match up to 10% of your salary with no vesting period


• Flexible paid time-off-policy (generally around 25 days per year), plus 11 paid federal holidays


• Up to 12 weeks paid-time-off for all eligible new birth, adoption, or foster parents


• Performance rewards, including annual salary increase, annual performance bonus, spot bonuses, and stock options


• Business development / sales bonuses


• Referral bonuses


• Annual $2,000 allowance for professional development


• Annual $750 allowance for tech-related purchases


• Annual swag budget of $100 to display your Skylight pride with some merchandise (hoodies, hats, and more)


• Dollar-for-dollar charity donation matching, up to $500 per year


• Flexible, remote-friendly work environment


• An environment that empowers you to unleash your superpowers for public good

Interview tips

We want you to have a great interview experience with us! Here are some tips to help you prepare for a successful interview:

• Visit our join page to learn more about how our interview process works.


• Check out our Career Pathways framework to learn more about the different roles within Skylight and the skills needed to do them.


• If you’d like to request reasonable accommodations during the application or interviewing process, please contact our recruiting team at [email protected].

We participate in E-Verify and upon hire, will provide the federal government with your Form I-9 information to confirm that you’re authorized to work in the U.S.

We are an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, national origin, sex, religion, age, disability, veteran status, or any other category protected by applicable law.