Technical Program Manager, Trade Compliance

Planet•Washington, DC

7h•$127,000 - $180,600•Hybrid

About The Position

Planet is seeking a Technical Program Manager (TPM) for Trade Compliance to join its product and software development and data analytics teams. The TPM will be responsible for ensuring compliance with complex regulatory requirements, translating them into practical product features and workflows within a rapid development environment. This role involves navigating ITAR/EAR and OFAC/sanctions requirements, as well as their global equivalents, to ensure trade compliance is integrated into product and software development architecture and deployment workflows. The position supports innovation by building compliance into the product lifecycle. This is a full-time, hybrid role requiring presence in the Washington, DC or Denver, CO office three days per week.

Requirements

4 to 6 years of relevant experience in export controls, international trade compliance, or regulatory compliance program management within a high-tech or aerospace environment.
Practical knowledge of ITAR (International Traffic in Arms Regulations) and EAR (Export Administration Regulations), specifically as they apply to software, dual-use items, encryption, and satellite/geospatial data analytics.
Technical Vocabulary: Ability to understand and converse fluently in "product language" (e.g., APIs, cloud infrastructure, containerization, and data pipeline architecture) to effectively translate across product/engineering roadmaps and compliance.
Experience with the product life cycle: concept through development, launch preparation, go-to-market, deprecations, and end-of-life.
Analytical, problem-solving, and creative thinking skills paired with the ability to communicate findings and recommendations.
Equally comfortable explaining your analyses and recommendations to business leaders as you are discussing technical trade-offs with engineers.
Ability to balance the tactical day-to-day with forward-looking improvements to scale operational efficiencies.
Experience working inside dynamic software engineering environments: CI/CD pipelines, cloud infrastructure, and Agile methodologies.

Nice To Haves

Ability to obtain clearance.
Experience with remote sensing, earth observation data, or geospatial systems.
Experience working with remote, worldwide teams.
Demonstrated success in optimizing processes and tools to scale development cycles.
Proactive approach to learning and applying emerging regulatory standards to product development.

Responsibilities

Drive and enable trade compliance as a scalable, structured framework rather than ad-hoc requirements, enabling compliance to be built seamlessly into a rapid development environment.
Collaborate with product managers and engineers to understand product roadmaps and product lifecycle, and drive trade compliance requirements.
Apply a pragmatic, risk-based approach to compliance. Evaluate technical trade-offs and guide product teams on how to meet ITAR/EAR without sacrificing speed-to-market.
Manage the contract and relationship with compliance vendors.
Conduct and document systematic Export Classification Orders of Review (e.g., ITAR and EAR) for complex data analytics and software solutions.
Establish and maintain rigorous contemporaneous documentation tracking design intent/decisions and their impact on the export controls associated with the product/solution.
To ensure ITAR/EAR compliance, design, implement, and audit strict technical access controls to govern product development work amongst US and non-US based software development teams based upon product/software classification.
Work with product teams to develop Know Your Customer (KYC) and restricted party screening processes and workflows to tie into Planet’s restricted party screening solution and ensure compliance with OFAC/sanctions requirements (and applicable global equivalents).