Technical Product Manager , Fight Friction

Be yourself at Protolabs Studies have shown that women and people of color are less likely to apply to jobs unless they meet every single qualification.  We are an equal opportunity employer, and we are committed to building a diverse team that feels they are valued in the workplace.  So do you feel you do not meet every single requirement but still intrigued? We encourage you to still apply!  You can help make our company even better.  We do not discriminate based on race, color, national origin, sexual orientation, gender, age, mental or physical ability, or any way you represent yourself.  We strongly believe diversity makes for more successful teams. Why Protolabs? We are the leaders in digital manufacturing. We hire doers, makers, and creative thinkers who tackle our roles with an entrepreneurial spirit. Our culture is centered around meaningful work that brings new and innovative products to market at unprecedented speeds. We are a diverse team that comes from all walks of life and take pride in our team who is smart, genuine, humble, and passionate about what we do. It’s our people who fuel our creativity and make our culture feel like home. What You'll Do Own and maintain the product roadmap for the assigned ecosystem area, balancing new capability development against friction-reduction and quality-of-experience work Translate business and customer needs into clear requirements, user stories, and acceptance criteria for the engineering team Prioritize the backlog using a consistent framework, balancing engineering capacity, customer/business impact, and cross-functional input Partner with engineering leads on release planning, scope trade-offs, and delivery timelines; coordinate launch and rollout activities Define and track success metrics for shipped work, including adoption, quality, and friction-reduction indicators Partner directly with Sales and Customer Success to systematically surface friction points across the ecosystem — including lost or stalled deals, recurring support escalations, churn signals, and workaround patterns — and translate them into a prioritized, actionable backlog Act as the coordination point between engineering, Sales, and Customer Success so that friction-related fixes move through hand-offs cleanly rather than stalling between teams, despite having no direct authority over those teams Establish and run a recurring intake and feedback loop (e.g., regular syncs, a shared submission process, or office hours) so Sales and Customer Success have a known, reliable channel for raising friction issues rather than relying on ad hoc escalation Report on friction-reduction progress using concrete before/after metrics (e.g., ticket volume, time-to-resolution, deal-blocking issues resolved, repeat-escalation rate), and communicate that progress back to Sales, Customer Success, and engineering leadership Facilitate trade-off conversations when friction-reduction priorities compete with other roadmap commitments, ensuring decisions and rationale are visible to all stakeholders Represent the voice of the customer and front-line teams in engineering planning and prioritization discussions Identify opportunities for continuous improvement in how the team identifies, triages, and resolves ecosystem friction. What It Takes A degree in Business, Computer Science, or a related field, or equivalent practical experience 4+ years' experience in technical product management, ideally supporting a software engineering team Experience working directly with Sales and/or Customer Success teams, ideally in a cross-functional, platform, or ecosystem-facing role Experience coordinating delivery across multiple teams without direct authority over those teams Preferred Qualifications Prior experience in a platform, ecosystem, or internal-tools product role spanning multiple customer-facing teams Experience building or running a formal intake/feedback process between product and go-to-market teams Exposure to complex operational environments where technology, people and process all need to work together You Might Be a Great Fit If Product & analytical skills Comfortable working with funnels, experiments and cost/benefit framing to support decisions Ability to define clear success metrics and measure product performance against business outcomes and KPIs User-centric mindset with the ability to balance customer, business and operational considerations Collaboration & communication Strong written and verbal communication skills with technical and non-technical stakeholders Able to create clarity in complex domains and build alignment without direct authority Pragmatic, decisive and impact-oriented: you focus on outcomes over outputs What's In It For You! We offer a competitive salary and total rewards package We offer amazing benefits including but not limited to: Health Insurance: Traditional OR High Deductible plan Flexible Spending Accounts Health Savings Account (including employer contributions) Dental and Vision Basic and Supplemental Life Insurance Short-Term and Long-Term Disability Paid caregiver leave You will receive at least 3 weeks of PTO + Wellness + Holiday Pay + Volunteer Hours 401k with company match and immediate vest Employee Stock Purchase Program at a discounted rate Matching grants through Protolabs foundation And More! Proto Labs maintains ITAR-compliant operations in all of our United States based facilities. Due to ITAR regulations, this role is only open to U.S. Citizens, lawful permanent residents (green card holders) or foreign nationals granted refugee or asylee status. Individuals with temporary visas (e.g. E, F-1, H-1, H-2, L, B, J, TN or OPT) are not eligible for hire in this role. Proto Labs, Inc. is an Equal Opportunity Employer Physical Demands: While performing the essential duties of this job, the employee is regularly required to sit; use a computer keyboard, monitor and mouse, telephone and printer; reach with hands, and arms, talk, see and hear. The employee is occasionally required to stand, walk, stoop or kneel and must occasionally lift and/or move up to 25 pounds. Work Environment: Indoors (A/C); nonsmoking; the majority of this job function is performed in an office setting requiring normal safety precautions. However, there may be job duties that require the employee to spend time in the manufacturing areas exposed to machinery and noise; eye protection occasionally required. Occasionally works in outside weather conditions. Occasionally works near moving mechanical parts and in high, precarious places and is occasionally exposed to wet and/or humid conditions, fumes or airborne particles, toxic or caustic chemicals, risk of electrical shock and vibration. The noise level in the work environment is usually quiet to moderate.