Senior Staff Technical Program Manager - Compute Platform

IonQ•Boulder, WA

2d•Onsite

About The Position

The Compute Platform team at IonQ is responsible for transforming quantum capability into quantum utility by building the APIs, cloud infrastructure, developer tools, and application layer that connect IonQ's Quantum Processing Units (QPUs) to users. This role is critical as powerful hardware is ineffective without the platform to access it. IonQ is seeking a Senior Staff Technical Program Manager to lead cross-functional programs focused on the application platform, developer tooling, and compiler stack. This individual will report directly to the VP of the department and will have program-level decision-making authority and ownership. The role involves working across four engineering teams and approximately forty engineers, supporting multiple concurrent programs in an environment of high ambiguity, as the challenges of commercializing quantum computing are still being defined. This is a high-visibility position with responsibility for some of the company's highest-priority initiatives, requiring regular interaction with senior technical leadership and key partners.

Requirements

8+ years of experience managing technical programs and delivering against aggressive timelines.
Proven track record of leading technical teams through genuine ambiguity, not just executing defined plans.
Experience in developer tools, SDKs, compilers, or adjacent platform software.
A habit of transforming diffuse problems into specific, minimal, assignable asks.
Technical fluency to engage directly with engineering leads on scoping and tradeoffs, with comfort reading and reasoning about code.
Willingness to re-baseline against reality rather than defend outdated dates, and the judgment to distinguish motivating targets from fictional ones.
Experience building or automating the reconciliation between planning documents and ticket systems, treating drift as a defect.
Fluency in moving between fast-cycle delivery and longer-horizon program building as needed.
Experience using AI as a core part of program management workflows, with a desire to expand its application.
Experience in customer-facing technical roles.
Highly effective written and verbal communication skills.

Nice To Haves

Experience establishing program tracking and reporting infrastructure from scratch, including designing team operating cadences and polling affected individuals before changes.
Customer-facing technical experience.
Capacity and staffing modeling from conflicting inputs, with the discipline to label unknowns as unknown.
Demonstrated ability to earn technical stakeholders' trust through consistency and results.
Genuine enthusiasm for reading and writing PRDs and ERDs.
Working knowledge of quantum computing (no quantum background required; training will be provided).

Responsibilities

Own the end-to-end delivery of IonQ's application platform, developer tools, and compiler roadmap, spanning numerous cross-functional development threads.
Partner with engineering leadership to translate technical vision into incremental, shippable milestones, proactively identifying risks and mitigations.
Build and manage timelines, tracking, and reporting systems that are actively used by teams, with success measured by adoption.
Ensure the accuracy and consistency of planning documents, trackers, and Jira, closing gaps and automating checks.
Make invisible work visible by rigorously tracking on-call burden, sustaining load, and technical debt alongside feature delivery.
Engage deeply in long-pole problems and collaborate with teams when programs stall.
Surface unresolved risks early, even without a complete solution or full stakeholder alignment.
Manage dependencies across internal and external teams, both technical and non-technical.
Write and present concise, data-driven status updates to senior leadership.
Assist in transforming promising off-roadmap engineer ideas into formal proposals for prioritization.