Product Development Manager (Dame Labs Lead)

dameproducts • New York, NY

2d • Hybrid

About The Position

Dame Products is a founder-led sexual wellness brand that makes doctor-approved, community-tested products. The Product Development Manager will lead Dame Labs, the company’s community-driven product development program, and guide products from customer research and early ideas through production and retail. This is a hands-on execution role focused on understanding customer needs, making evidence-backed product recommendations, and managing the details required to bring products to market. The role works directly with the founder and has the opportunity to grow with strong performance.

The manager will oversee customer research, surveys, testing, events, product roadmaps, and cross-functional development projects. They will manage the engineer, industrial designer, and testing lead, keeping priorities, timelines, decisions, and responsibilities clear. They will use human-centered design and AI tools to improve research synthesis, feedback monitoring, and project management.

Requirements

• At least 3 years of experience related to making physical products and understanding their customers; relevant backgrounds may include industrial design, engineering, product marketing, product development, or research.
• Demonstrated curiosity about customers, including experience speaking with customers, conducting surveys or tests, and changing a decision based on findings.
• Experience keeping projects with many moving parts on track and holding designers and engineers accountable to deadlines.
• Regular use of AI tools at work and informed perspectives on AI agents.
• Comfort discussing sex, bodies, and pleasure openly with a range of people.
• Motivation to take on significant responsibility early and demonstrate results.

Nice To Haves

• Experience with physical products, especially in wellness, beauty, personal care, or consumer hardware.
• Formal user research training.
• Experience building or running a community, beta panel, or events program.
• Startup experience building things from scratch.

Responsibilities

• Lead Dame Labs and grow its product tester community; establish and manage testing programs.
• Conduct customer interviews, in-home studies, and tester panels to understand customer experiences and product needs.
• Design and field surveys, then synthesize results into clear recommendations.
• Plan and host focus groups, co-design workshops, and community events, both in person and online.
• Present evidence-backed recommendations to leadership about future products.
• Manage product development projects through design, prototyping, testing, doctor approval, and production.
• Coordinate with manufacturers, obtain samples, maintain schedules, and clarify project timelines, owners, and decisions.
• Manage the engineer, industrial designer, and testing lead by setting priorities and deadlines and holding the team accountable.
• Own and maintain the product roadmap and lead biweekly product meetings.
• Apply human-centered design, keeping people’s bodies, stories, and needs central to decisions and testing early and often.
• Use AI tools and agents to synthesize interviews, monitor reviews and community feedback, and automate project-management work.

Benefits

• Direct work with the founder and meaningful ownership.
• Opportunity to see products developed with the role’s contribution sold in retail stores.
• Customer research that directly shapes the company’s products.
• Work at a company that regards pleasure as a core part of a healthy life.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Manager
• Education Level: No Education Listed