Project Manager – Platform & Systems Development

Project Manager – Platform & Systems Development

Position Overview

American AI Logistics (AAIL) is seeking a seasoned Project Manager to own planning, coordination, and delivery across our product and engineering organization. This is a hands-on, high-accountability role that combines project management, product ownership, and scrum leadership for AutoBid—our cloud-based B2B SaaS platform supporting U.S. government procurement workflows.

You will be the single point of coordination between leadership, engineering, and customers. You're not just tracking tickets—you're shaping what gets built, why, and when. You'll run sprint ceremonies, own the product backlog, define quarterly roadmaps, and ensure the team ships predictably against business and operational priorities.

We are replacing a role, not creating one. There is an existing team, existing customers, existing codebase, and existing expectations. You need to hit the ground running.

What This Role Actually Is

This is three jobs in one. If any of these feel outside your comfort zone, this isn't the right fit:

Product Manager. You will translate customer feedback, compliance requirements, and business strategy into a prioritized product backlog. You decide what gets built next—and what doesn't. You need strong opinions backed by data, not a preference for building whatever is loudest.

Scrum Master. You will run daily standups, sprint planning, sprint reviews, and retrospectives. You protect the team's focus, remove blockers in real time, and hold people (including yourself) accountable to commitments. If you've never run a sprint cycle end-to-end, this isn't the role.

Project Manager. You will own quarterly planning, roadmap sequencing, capacity allocation, and cross-functional coordination. You track delivery against milestones, manage dependencies, and communicate status to leadership with precision—not optimism.

Key Responsibilities

• Own the product backlog: prioritize features, bugs, tech debt, and compliance work based on business value, customer impact, and engineering capacity
• Run all Agile/Scrum ceremonies: daily standups, sprint planning, sprint reviews, retrospectives
• Define and maintain quarterly roadmaps with clear milestones, owners, and delivery targets
• Reconcile competing priorities—new feature requests, customer escalations, operational needs, compliance mandates—against committed sprint and quarterly objectives
• Partner directly with engineering, DevOps, security, and leadership to translate business needs into executable development plans
• Track delivery across frontend, backend, infrastructure, and data services against agreed timelines and SLOs
• Coordinate release planning, change management, and production deployment processes
• Identify risks early and drive mitigation—scope trade-offs, dependency management, resource reallocation
• Maintain clear, current documentation of plans, decisions, trade-offs, and status for leadership and stakeholders
• Support post-incident reviews, track remediation work, and ensure follow-through on corrective actions
• Serve as the connective tissue between what the business needs and what engineering delivers

Required Qualifications

• 7+ years of experience spanning technical project management, product management, or delivery leadership
• Demonstrated experience as a practicing Scrum Master or Agile lead—not just "familiar with Agile," but someone who has owned and run the process
• Proven track record of managing a product backlog and making prioritization decisions, not just executing someone else's roadmap
• Strong experience planning and managing development work on a quarterly cadence
• Demonstrated success managing the full Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC)
• Experience working with cloud-based SaaS systems in production environments
• Hands-on familiarity with CI/CD pipelines, modern development practices, and change management
• Strong analytical skills—you use metrics, velocity data, and operational KPIs to drive decisions, not gut feel
• Excellent written and verbal communication—you can align technical and non-technical stakeholders without losing either audience
• Must be available for in-person collaboration in the Colorado Front Range area on a regular basis. This is not a fully remote position for this role—expect consistent in-person working sessions with the engineering team.

Who Should NOT Apply

We want to be upfront to save everyone time:

• Pure PMs who don't run scrums. This role requires hands-on Agile facilitation every single day, not just strategy and roadmaps.
• Pure Scrum Masters who don't own product. You need to make prioritization calls, talk to customers, and shape what gets built—not just facilitate process.
• People who need heavy onboarding. There is an existing team, existing product, and existing customers. You need to assess the current state quickly and start driving improvements within your first sprint.
• People who manage by status report. We need someone in the details—reading PRs, understanding architecture decisions, knowing why a task is blocked, not just that it is.
• People who aren't in or near the Colorado Front Range. We need regular in-person presence with the team. If you're not within commuting distance, this won't work regardless of your qualifications.

Preferred Qualifications

• Prior experience as a software engineer, DevOps engineer, or technical lead
• Hands-on experience with the Atlassian suite (Jira, Confluence, Bitbucket)
• Experience managing systems with high availability targets (99.9%+ SLOs)
• Familiarity with AWS-based architectures and distributed systems
• Experience supporting security, compliance, or audit-driven development (SOC, FedRAMP, CMMC, risk remediation)
• Background working with data pipelines, ML/LLM-enabled systems, or automation platforms
• Experience in defense, government contracting, or regulated industries

Compensation & Benefits

• Total compensation: $80,000–$130,000 (base + equity), depending on experience
• Flexible working hours
• Opportunities for growth in a high-trajectory defense technology company
• An innovative, mission-driven team environment
• Be part of a company strengthening American military readiness

What Success Looks Like

Within 30 days, you've assessed the current state of the product, team, and process—and you have a clear picture of what's working and what isn't. Within 60 days, you've taken full ownership of the backlog, sprint cadence, and quarterly planning process. Within 90 days, the team is shipping predictably, priorities are clear, and leadership trusts your judgment on what to build and when.

Development work is predictable, transparent, and aligned with business priorities. Quarterly plans are realistic and consistently delivered. New requests are evaluated objectively against capacity and commitments. Engineering is focused on execution. The product is improving every sprint.

About American AI Logistics

American AI Logistics (AAIL) is a defense logistics company on a mission to strengthen American military readiness. We ensure that the men and women who defend our country have the parts and components they need, when they need them. By combining strategic acquisitions with proprietary technology, we're modernizing a supply chain that has remained largely unchanged for decades—making our nation safer and more prepared.

Industry: Technology, Information and Internet 

Employment Type: Full-time