Associate Portfolio Manager (Remote)

Cengage Group•Virtual US OH, OH

8d•$58,300 - $75,750•Remote

About The Position

The Associate Portfolio Manager (APM) is a Cengage School Portfolio Management Role at Cengage. The APM creates product strategy by understanding the audience, analyzing the market and competitive trends, developing hypotheses, testing ideas in the market, processing data, and ultimately making product design and content decisions based on these insights and evidence. The APM leads product development, collaborating with team members to ensure on-time delivery of high-quality learning experiences. The APM clearly articulates the features and benefits of a product to the market, enabling the creation and delivery of compelling messaging for target audiences through measurable campaigns and programs. This APM role will support the Career and Technical Education portfolio in the School market.

Requirements

Creative and curious problem solving and collaboration
Understanding of the educational technology and publishing industry
Ability to clearly articulate vision and strategy and help team members understand how their work impacts business success
Customer focus; understanding of how customer needs and challenges translate into opportunities
Demonstration of strong communication skills with keen ability to facilitate team meetings, presentations, focus groups, and interviews.
BA or BS Degree
Minimum 2 years in product management, product development, or other relevant portfolio management role
Cross-functional team leadership experience
Ability to inspire change through influence; honed social skills
Self-discipline with a high degree of accountability
Strong financial analysis and modeling skills and an understanding of business metrics
Natural curiosity and willingness to learn paired with a desire for continuous improvement
Confirmed written and verbal abilities enabling the preparation and presentation of information and recommendations to a diverse and senior level audience
Expected travel ~10% of time
Proficiency with Word, Excel, and PowerPoint

Responsibilities

Lead a profitable product line and develop strategic business plans.
Provide product leadership, representing the portfolio and customers across audiences.
Use data to make market-informed business proposals, take mitigated risks, and guide strategic decisions.
Defines long-term goals based on research and trends, and sets metrics-driven milestones, making connections across datasets and courses to devise solutions to complex business challenges
Balance experience, market knowledge, and insights to make impactful decisions and long-term plans.
Translate priorities into organized end-to-end development plans with budgets, resources, performance goals, and key checkpoints.
Provide project team direction, facilitating effective communication, and ensuring timely delivery of multiple products simultaneously within scope and budget.
Cultivate an environment of creativity and collaboration.
Deliver quality learning experiences to students and instructors.
Establish and maintain relationships with key authors and adoption decision makers to gain customer insights, strengthen adoptions, and identify new talent.
Develop a deep understanding of competitors and an ability to anticipate competitor activity.
Identify and test product ideas within segments, including the administration of focus groups, advisory boards, reviews, and customer meetings as appropriate.
Regularly analyze product and portfolio plans to align forecasting and measurement of progress towards goals.
Partner closely with Marketing and Sales teams to seed and secure adoptions.
Work closely with colleagues in other functional areas (Learning Design, Content Production, Marketing, Sales, Technology, etc.) on discipline-specific initiatives.
Create compelling needs-based discipline, course, and product positioning and customer segments as inputs for campaign and sales enablement efforts.
Make presentations at internal and external meetings, campus visits, and academic conventions in support of sales efforts and to drive sales.