Principal Product Manager, Agentic Commerce & Payments

Early Warning® • Chicago, IL

21h • $173,000 - $242,000 • Hybrid

About The Position

The Principal Product Manager at Paze is a senior individual contributor who defines and advances product strategy for complex products, product groups, or customer solutions. The role establishes product vision, turns customer and market needs into prioritized outcomes, and leads cross-functional alignment from discovery through commercialization and ongoing optimization. It operates autonomously in ambiguous, evolving conditions and influences executives, technical teams, business partners, customers, and external stakeholders to make product decisions, manage risk, and deliver measurable customer and business value.

This role leads the strategy and development of secure, trusted payment experiences for emerging AI-enabled and agentic commerce ecosystems. It evaluates evolving technologies and protocols, identifies product opportunities and user journeys, and guides capabilities from early concepts and MVPs into scalable commercial solutions.

The position follows Early Warning’s hybrid work model. The work takes place in a normal office environment and is primarily sedentary, with extensive computer use and periods of sitting of approximately four hours. Occasional standing, walking, kneeling, and reaching may be required. The employee must be able to lift 10 pounds occasionally and/or a negligible amount of force frequently, and must have the visual acuity and dexterity needed to use computers and office equipment and handle documents. The role also requires communicating with internal and/or external customers. Essential functions and physical requirements may be performed with or without reasonable accommodation. Candidates must independently be eligible to work in the United States at the date of hire; visa sponsorship is not available.

Requirements

• Typically 12 or more years of progressive experience, or a demonstrated portfolio consistent with the experience required for the role.
• Bachelor’s degree or an equivalent combination of education and experience.
• Demonstrated experience defining product strategy, roadmaps, priorities, and measurable outcomes for complex customer-facing products or platforms.
• Proven experience leading products through discovery, development, launch, commercialization, and ongoing optimization in a cross-functional environment.
• Ability to operate independently through ambiguity, make product tradeoffs, and drive major initiatives across organizational boundaries.
• Experience translating customer insights, market signals, data, and business needs into product requirements and decisions.
• Strong technical fluency and ability to partner effectively with engineering and architecture teams on complex product solutions.
• Knowledge of payment processing, fraud prevention, digital commerce ecosystems, or related trusted-transaction capabilities.
• Ability to evaluate emerging technologies and translate uncertain or evolving capabilities into product strategy, requirements, user journeys, and scalable solutions.
• Experience in payments, financial services, digital commerce, or another regulated technology environment.
• Background and drug screen.
• Independent eligibility to work in the United States at the date of hire; employment visa sponsorship is unavailable.

Nice To Haves

• Experience working across financial institutions, payment networks, merchants, technology partners, or ecosystem participants.
• Experience defining product approaches for new industry protocols, interoperability models, trust frameworks, or other emerging commerce standards.

Responsibilities

• Define and communicate product vision, strategy, roadmaps, investment priorities, and success measures for complex products, product groups, customer solutions, and agentic commerce solutions.
• Lead the product lifecycle from discovery and concept development through prioritization, requirements, delivery, launch, commercialization, performance management, and continuous improvement.
• Lead 0-to-1 development and commercialization of agentic commerce capabilities amid significant market and technical ambiguity.
• Evaluate emerging protocols, ecosystem models, technologies, and industry trends to identify product opportunities, requirements, risks, and user journeys.
• Build alignment across Product, Engineering, Design, Marketing, Sales, Analytics, Operations, Legal, Risk, Compliance, Fraud, and other stakeholders.
• Synthesize customer research, behavioral data, partner feedback, market signals, concept testing, analytics, and experimentation into product insights and decisions.
• Translate customer, business, and technical needs into clear requirements, outcomes, success measures, and decision frameworks.
• Partner with technology leaders and Engineering to assess solution options, manage dependencies and tradeoffs, and evolve MVP capabilities into scalable, secure, and reliable products.
• Collaborate with financial institutions, payment networks, merchants, and ecosystem partners to define trusted commerce experiences.
• Establish and monitor adoption, customer experience, financial, operational, and risk measures, and use results to adjust priorities and improve performance.
• Influence executive and external stakeholder decisions by communicating complex product topics, tradeoffs, recommendations, and shared priorities.

Benefits

• Competitive medical plans (PPO/HDHP), dental insurance, and vision insurance.
• Company contributions to a Health Savings Account (HSA) or pre-tax flexible spending accounts (FSA) for commuting, health, and dependent care expenses.
• 401(k) plan with a 100% Company Safe Harbor Match on the first 6% deferred, immediately upon eligibility.
• Flexible Time Off for exempt employees and generous PTO for non-exempt employees.
• 11 paid company holidays and a paid volunteer day.
• 12 weeks of paid parental leave.
• Maven Family Planning support for egg freezing, fertility, adoption, surrogacy, pregnancy, postpartum, early pediatrics, and returning to work.
• Discretionary incentive plan.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Principal