PRODUCT MANAGER, UC INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY MANAGEMENT SYSTEM - REMOTE WITHIN CALIFORNIA

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UC OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT

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Department Overview
The University of California's Digital Innovation & Technology (UC DigIT) department powers the digital ecosystem that supports UC's academic, research, and administrative mission. As the systemwide digital engine, UC DigIT transforms complex enterprise systems, infrastructure, and security services into inclusive and human-centered solutions designed to meet challenges at UC scale.

Position Summary
The IT Product Manager, Intellectual Property (IP), serves as the strategic product leader for the University of California's Intellectual Property Management System (IPMS), providing vision, leadership, and governance for a complex, systemwide capability. Operating within UC's highly decentralized environment, this role builds consensus among executive leaders, Technology Transfer Office personnel across locations, UCOP ITE leadership and staff, and UCOP DigIT leaders and staff to align diverse priorities into a shared product strategy and technology roadmap.

The Product Manager leads product strategy, roadmap development, and investment prioritization to deliver measurable business outcomes while driving innovation, automation, operational efficiency, and continuous improvement across IP operations and IPMS services. This role evaluates business needs, vendor roadmap changes, and advises executive leadership on strategic opportunities, risks, and tradeoffs. The Product Manager translates business objectives into product direction and functional requirements, facilitates difficult decisions among competing interests, and negotiates agreements that balance location-specific needs with systemwide objectives.

Success in this role depends on exceptional leadership, executive communication, relationship management, and political acumen, as well as the ability to influence people and outcomes without direct authority. The Product Manager works across business and technology domains to guide cross-functional teams, build durable partnerships, and champion adoption of new capabilities that improve service delivery and maximize the value of the IPMS investment.

Reporting to the Director of Product, Project, and Service Management, the IT Product Manager also provides leadership to the Business Systems Analysts (BSAs), setting priorities, clarifying outcomes, and empowering the team to build strong and effective relationships across the business and IT communities.

This position is fully remote from within California. If you do not currently reside in California, you must be willing to relocate within an agreed upon time frame to be considered for the position.

Key Responsibilities

25% Product Strategy, Vision & Roadmap: Develop and communicate the long-term product vision, strategy, and technology roadmap for the University of California's Intellectual Property Management System (IPMS), ensuring alignment with institutional priorities, research administration objectives, and technology strategy. Own the product lifecycle for Wellspring Evolve and related technologies, continuously evaluating business needs, emerging capabilities, vendor roadmaps, and industry trends to identify opportunities for innovation, automation, and service improvement. Translate strategic business objectives into prioritized product investments, balancing customer value, technical feasibility, risk, compliance requirements, and available resources. Establish product success measures and use customer feedback, operational metrics, and business outcomes to continuously refine product direction.

25% Executive Stakeholder Engagement & Strategic Partnerships: Build and maintain trusted relationships with executive leadership, Technology Transfer Offices, UCOP ITE, UCOP DigIT, campus stakeholders, and external vendors to develop a shared product vision and drive successful business outcomes. Lead strategic discussions across a diverse stakeholder community, facilitating alignment, negotiating competing priorities, and building consensus in a highly decentralized governance environment. Serve as the primary product advocate for customers, ensuring product investments improve user experience, operational effectiveness, and service quality across the UC system. Partner with solution architects, engineering teams, cybersecurity, and business leaders to ensure product strategy aligns with security standards, and long-term technology direction.

20% Product Leadership & Delivery: Provide leadership and day to day direction to Business Analysts, establishing priorities, defining expected outcomes, and fostering a customer-focused, collaborative team culture. Guide the translation of business strategy into product capabilities, functional requirements, and delivery priorities that maximize business value. Lead cross-functional planning and decision-making throughout the product lifecycle, removing barriers, resolving conflicts, and ensuring delivery teams remain focused on achieving strategic business outcomes. Promote continuous improvement through process optimization, automation, service innovation, and adoption of product management best practices.

10% Organizational Change & Vendor Management: Champion organizational change by building stakeholder engagement and adoption strategies that maximize realization of product value. Collaborate with business leaders, technical teams, and vendors to successfully implement new capabilities while minimizing organizational disruption. Develop strategic partnerships with software vendors, evaluating product direction, influencing roadmap discussions where appropriate, and ensuring vendor investments continue to meet the University's evolving business needs.

10% Product Lifecycle Management & Operational Excellence: Oversee the ongoing health, sustainability, and evolution of the Intellectual Property Management System, ensuring reliable operations while continuously improving platform capabilities that meet business needs. Prioritize enhancements, technical debt, and operational improvements using customer feedback, business value, risk, and organizational priorities. Partner with engineering and support teams to resolve complex issues and optimize system performance. Ensure product capabilities support applicable University policies, regulatory requirements, and security standards.

10% Product Governance, Performance & Executive Communication: Establish and maintain product governance processes, performance metrics, and reporting that provide transparency into roadmap progress, service performance, and business outcomes. Develop executive communications that clearly articulate product strategy, investment recommendations, delivery progress, risks, and opportunities. Monitor key performance indicators and customer feedback to evaluate product success and inform future investment decisions. Maintain product artifacts, governance documentation, and business process models that support long-term product sustainability and organizational knowledge.

Experience
Required Qualifications

• Min 8 years of relevant experience, inclusive of at least 5 years of experience as a senior product manager, senior business analyst, senior program manager, or similar role focused on leadership in delivery of enterprise software products.

Skills and Abilities
Required Qualifications

• Demonstrated experience serving as the strategic product leader for complex enterprise software products or platforms, with responsibility for defining product vision, strategy, investment priorities, and multi-year technology roadmaps that deliver measurable business outcomes.

• Demonstrated success leading products within highly matrixed, decentralized, or multi-stakeholder organizations, with the ability to influence decisions, build consensus, and negotiate priorities among executives, business leaders, technical teams, vendors, and other stakeholders without relying on formal authority.

• Proven ability to establish trusted partnerships with senior leaders and customers, translating organizational strategy and business objectives into product direction, investment decisions, and prioritized product roadmaps.

• Experience balancing customer needs, business value, technical feasibility, security, compliance, and organizational priorities to make strategic product decisions and maximize the value of technology investments.

• Demonstrated experience leading cross-functional teams through the full product lifecycle, including product strategy, discovery, roadmap development, delivery, adoption, performance measurement, and continuous improvement within Agile, iterative, or hybrid delivery environments.

• Experience working with enterprise platforms that support sensitive, regulated, or mission-critical business processes, with knowledge of governance, privacy, security, compliance, auditability, and risk management principles.

• Exceptional leadership, negotiation, facilitation, and conflict resolution skills, with demonstrated success building alignment across organizations with competing priorities and diverse perspectives.

• Outstanding verbal, written, and presentation skills, including the ability to communicate complex business and technical concepts effectively to executive leadership, governance bodies, and non-technical stakeholders.

• Strong strategic, analytical, and systems-thinking skills, with the ability to evaluate complex business challenges, identify opportunities for innovation and process improvement, and develop product strategies that deliver long-term organizational value.

• Demonstrated experience leading, mentoring, and developing professional staff while fostering a collaborative, customer-focused, and results-oriented culture that empowers teams to achieve shared business outcomes.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience serving as the Product Manager for enterprise Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) platforms, preferably systems of record that support complex business operations, regulatory compliance, or knowledge-intensive organizations. Experience with Wellspring Evolve or similar intellectual property management platforms is highly desirable.

• Experience working within higher education, public sector, healthcare, research, or other large, highly matrixed organizations with decentralized governance models and diverse stakeholder communities.

• Experience supporting or leading products that enable intellectual property management, research administration, technology transfer, innovation management, legal operations, portfolio management, or other enterprise platforms supporting the commercialization of research and innovation.

• Familiarity with the intellectual property lifecycle, including invention disclosures, patent and trademark prosecution, licensing, commercialization, portfolio management, maintenance activities, and collaboration among research, legal, and technology transfer organizations.

• Experience leading organizational change initiatives that improve technology adoption, modernize business processes, and increase the value realized from enterprise technology investments.

• Experience using customer research, operational metrics, user feedback, and business outcomes to inform product strategy, prioritize investments, and measure product success.

• Experience working within Agile, Lean Product Management, Product Operating Models, or other modern product management frameworks to deliver customer-centered products and continuous im