Sr. Beta Program Manager

Fortune Brands • Deerfield, CA

1d • $115,000 - $145,000 • Hybrid

About The Position

The Sr. Beta Program Manager is a hands-on leadership role at the center of Fortune Brands Innovations’ connected product validation strategy. This is not a project coordination role — it is a quality-focused, field-oriented program lead who owns the end-to-end consumer validation lifecycle across alpha, beta, and delta phases for smart home products spanning hardware, firmware, mobile applications, and cloud software. This role demands a candidate who combines the analytical rigor of a QA engineer, the cross-functional fluency of a product manager, and the field instincts of a hands-on technologist. You will be a trusted partner to QA, Engineering, Software Product Management, Hardware (Category) Product Management, UX, and Customer Support — and a vocal, data-backed advocate for real-world product quality. This role requires someone who rolls up their sleeves: reproducing reported issues, triaging bug quality before JIRA import, differentiating true defects from feature requests, and holding the line on release readiness — backed by data, not diplomacy.
POSITION LOCATION: This position can work hybrid in either Deerfield, IL or San Francisco, CA.

Requirements

• BA/BS degree in a technical, product, or business field; or equivalent practical experience.
• 7+ years of hands-on experience in beta/alpha/delta program management, user validation, or closely related roles in consumer hardware, IoT, or multi-platform software products.
• Demonstrated experience personally triaging, reproducing, and classifying bugs; proven ability to partner with QA in bug scrubs, validate reproducibility, and enforce submission quality standards.
• Strong technical fluency across the connected product stack: mobile applications (iOS/Android), cloud/backend services, embedded firmware, and consumer hardware.
• Hands-on experience with Centercode (or equivalent beta management platforms) and JIRA: configuring feedback templates, managing Centercode-to-JIRA import workflows, and building reporting well beyond default platform outputs.
• Experience building two-audience reporting: detailed cross-functional reports for Engineering/QA/Product and executive summaries with business impact framing.
• Experience with business intelligence tools (Power BI, Tableau, or equivalent) for dashboard creation and trend analysis.
• Proficiency with Confluence, Excel (Pivot Tables, advanced formulas), and SQL.
• Ability to manage multiple simultaneous programs without sacrificing quality.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills; ability to write precise bug reports, executive summaries, and stakeholder documentation.

Nice To Haves

• Experience with AI productivity tools — particularly Claude AI — for accelerating documentation, analysis, and reporting.
• Background in quality assurance (QA) engineering, software testing, or hardware validation; comfort reading device logs, crash reports, and firmware build notes.
• Experience with delta testing and post-launch product validation cycles.
• Familiarity with agile/scrum methodologies and SDLC processes.
• Experience at a leading consumer electronics, smart home, or IoT-focused organization with hardware, firmware, mobile, and cloud software products.
• Experience with Voice of Customer (VoC) frameworks and translating customer insights into action.
• Familiarity with mobile app testing (iOS/Android), OTA firmware update flows, and cloud service dependencies in connected product ecosystems.
• Understanding of prototype security protocols, hardware NDA management, and trade compliance requirements.
• Experience managing stakeholders from individual contributors to C-suite.
• Knowledge of user research methodologies.
• PMP or equivalent program management certification.

Responsibilities

• Consumer Validation Program Ownership Design and execute end-to-end consumer validation programs across alpha, beta, and delta stages for connected hardware, firmware, mobile apps, and cloud services.
• Develop structured test plans, targeted test scenarios, and use-case libraries with Product Management, QA, and Engineering — ensuring coverage of real-world edge cases.
• Manage simultaneous test programs with discipline: tester recruitment, device logistics, NDA and trade compliance, communications cadence, and issue tracking.
• Recruit and manage diverse, global tester pools segmented by persona, device type, geography, and platform to ensure representation across target markets.
• Monitor tester engagement; identify and address participation risks early to prevent drop-off and sustain high-quality feedback throughout test cycles.
• Coordinate required software builds, firmware versions, and hardware units to ensure program readiness across all phases.
• Partner with shipping and logistics teams to ensure on-time device delivery for synchronized program launches.
• Bug Triage, Signal Quality & QA Partnership Reproduce reported bugs from Centercode prior to JIRA import — verifying steps to reproduce, capturing logs/screenshots/video, and confirming device, firmware, and app version context.
• Work daily with QA to validate issue severity and classification ahead of bug scrubs; serve as the first quality gate for every ticket entering the engineering queue.
• Distinguish between verified software bugs, hardware/firmware defects, environment issues, duplicate reports, and feature requests — and reduce vague or non-actionable submissions through improved survey design, targeted feedback prompts, and tester education.
• Actively participate in cross-functional bug scrub sessions with QA, Engineering, and Product; present pre-triaged, evidence-backed issues with clear severity assessments.
• Own the Centercode-to-JIRA workflow: enforce submission quality standards, establish import criteria, and refine feedback templates to raise the baseline quality of inbound reports.
• Track issues from initial report through resolution; follow up with Engineering to confirm closure and communicate outcomes back to testers.
• Data, Insights & AI-Powered Analysis Use Claude AI and other AI-powered tools to accelerate documentation, analysis, survey development, and reporting — without substituting AI output for critical judgment.
• Synthesize survey data, telemetry, usage patterns, and qualitative tester feedback into actionable insights — not just summaries of Centercode’s default reports.
• Identify recurring failure patterns, user experience friction points, and systemic product risks before they become post-launch customer complaints.
• Apply critical judgment to AI-generated findings; bring domain expertise to distinguish meaningful signals from noise.
• Build customized dashboards and trend analyses beyond out-of-the-box platform views, tailored to team and leadership needs.
• Correlate beta feedback with Customer Support ticket trends, historical NPI data, and post-launch metrics to surface recurring or emerging issues early.
• Cross-Functional Partnership & Stakeholder Collaboration Serve as an embedded partner to QA, Engineering, Software PM, Hardware (Category) PM, UX, and Customer Support — not a peripheral coordinator.
• Translate real-world user feedback into concrete, prioritized product improvements that balance technical feasibility with customer impact.
• Advocate directly for product quality concerns backed by data — including flagging release-readiness risks to leadership when field evidence warrants it.
• Engage one-on-one with testers to gather qualitative feedback, troubleshoot reported issues, and maintain a high-quality tester experience.
• Coordinate with global stakeholders across multiple time zones.
• Maintain strict adherence to Prototype Security protocols and Trade Compliance requirements across all phases.
• Reporting: Cross-Functional & Executive Maintain two reporting tracks: detailed cross-functional reports (data-dense, issue-specific, and actionable for QA, Engineering, and Product) and executive summaries (business impact, release risk, and go/no-go recommendations).
• Develop weekly, milestone, and end-of-program reports with clear metrics: issue volume trends, severity distributions, tester engagement, signal-to-noise ratios, and reproduction rates.
• Create presentations for senior leadership grounded in field data — not sanitized for comfort.
• Use Power BI, Tableau, or equivalent tools to build repeatable, self-service reporting views for cross-functional partners.
• Program Continuous Improvement & Tooling Continuously improve testing frameworks, Centercode configurations, feedback templates, and tester onboarding processes.
• Build Confluence documentation that captures institutional knowledge: program playbooks, triage criteria, escalation paths, and lessons learned.
• Refine tester feedback quality through survey design best practices, targeted follow-up, and tester education.
• Monitor competitive landscape, industry trends, and evolving customer expectations to benchmark and strengthen program effectiveness.

Benefits

• employees will participate in either an annual bonus plan based on company and individual performance, or a role-based sales incentive plan.
• robust health plans, a market-leading 401(k) program with a company contribution, product discounts, flexible time off benefits, adoption benefits, and more.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Mid Level
• Number of Employees: 5,001-10,000 employees