Job Description
Over the last 10+ years, Ellevation Education has built a thriving business serving the administrators, specialists, and teachers who support English Learners (ELL) at public schools across the US. Today, over 1,800 school districts use our software to manage their EL programs and drive key outcomes for students. We are a successful, rapidly-growing business with a real mission—helping ELLs achieve their highest aspirations.
We are currently making a series of major investments in how our suite of products supports accessibility and assistive technology use to ensure we optimize usability for all studetns and teachers in schools around the country. To do this, we are developing deeper sophistication around WCAG criteria, ensuring usability of accessibility and accommodation supports, and how to navigate a myriad of strategic questions.
As the Product Manager, you will be the first hire on a team focused on developing key organizational competencies in the accessibility domain. You will regularly interface with members of Leadership as well as other leaders (Product Managers, Engineering Managers, Product Designers) across our suite of products to help define and execute against our accessibility strategy. You will leverage deep understanding of WCAG and familiarity with assistive technologies to create and maintain key accessibility documentation (ACRs, internal guidelines, etc.). Throughout all of this work, you will identify and weigh tradeoffs between short and long-term investments to align our accessibility strategy with our product strategy to maximize value for Ellevation and the customers we serve.
At Ellevation, Product Managers are responsible for working cross-functionally to ensure success across the end-to-end product life cycle, from discovery to delivery, to ensure the work of the product organization has a positive impact on our customers and on our company. This involves deeply understanding the business and developing relationships across the organization. Importantly, this means creating opportunities for others to plug in to your work and ensuring stakeholders understand what you are doing, why you are doing it, and that you have factored their ideas and/or concerns into that thinking.
Product Culture
We are organized into small product teams that focus on key problems to solve in the context of a specific domain. We focus on outcomes over output. Our teams are empowered to research, prototype, and solicit user feedback to validate hypotheses. We engage users early and rapidly iterate so that the end result is a high-confidence, high-value product. We aim to foster an environment where we have the runway to experiment and learn from failure while tackling tricky challenges.
Our teams are cross-functional in that they are made up of members of Product (Product Manager, UX Designer) and members of Engineering. Product and Engineering work hand-in-hand together—we call ourselves DevPro, and in fact, we rarely meet in isolation.
Clear vision and strong strategy are core principles within the Product organization. We value product managers who fully own the long-term vision—knowing where we are going and importantly why it matters for our customers. As strategy is meant to evolve, you will need to constantly identify increments, spot and mitigate risks, and position your team to meet the needs of the business on the way there.
We celebrate being accountable to outcomes, which means signing up to pursue that vision by knocking down obstacles that get in the way. This looks like conducting experiments which throw off learnings, adjusting strategy based on those learnings, and delivering products to end-users that change behavior and drive real value for the business.
\n- 1 month - Develop an understanding of the key challenges and strategic context facing Ellevation with a particular eye on accessibility and inclusive design. Work closely with members of R&D Leadership to understand Ellevation’s design system and overarching accessibility strategy. Learn about key in-progress initiatives across the product portfolio. Develop rapport with key stakeholders and team members at Ellevation and Curriculum Associates (our parent company).
- 3 months - Begin to shape and influence important decisions to drive forward Ellevation’s accessibility strategy. Get buy-in from key stakeholders around how we plan to document accessibility claims and begin to work with product and engineering leaders to inform iterative solutions. Establish influential, high-trust relationships across the organization in order to effectively advocate for accessibility goals.
- 6 months - Begin to take ownership over key components of Ellevation’s accessibility strategy. Effectively document and create buy-in around strategic accessibility claims. Work closely with colleagues on the commercial side of the business to build good governance around accessibility. Continue to grow influence across the organization.
- 12 months - Take full ownership over accessibility strategy. Drive key outcomes against our business goals and support the transformation of our product suite to ensure Ellevation is in a position to build towards our 5 year goal of serving 70% of the EL’s nationwide.
- You have 4-6+ years of relevant product management experience.
- You have a passion for inclusion as well as deep experience working with all things accessibility, especially the WCAG standards and supporting assistive technologies.
- You have a strong orientation to user experience and front-end application design.
- You have a track record of working cross-functionally to drive business outcomes, manage trade offs, and deliver iterative solutions in enterprise SaaS environment (bonus points for EdTech).
- You are highly accountable for your work; you own problems from beginning to end with urgency.
- You have excellent communication and presentation skills, with the ability to articulate nuanced strategic decisions to non subject matter experts.
- You are naturally curious and demonstrate an eagerness to learn from others.
Are you passionate about growth and eager to learn? Do you possess a drive to excel and make a difference? Ellevation values diversity, creativity, and a hunger for new perspectives. While our job postings outline preferred qualifications, we believe that talent comes in various forms. If you're motivated, adaptable, and ready to contribute, we encourage you to apply. We welcome candidates from all backgrounds and experiences, recognizing that unique skills and fresh outlooks are invaluable assets to our team. Don't let a checklist of requirements deter you – take the leap, and let's explore the possibilities together!
About Us:
At Ellevation, we develop world-class software to help educators serve the fastest growing population of K-12 students: English Learners (ELs). Ellevation helps school districts transform their Multilingual Learner programs and ensure all students can achieve their highest aspirations. Our product suite includes a best-in-class data and instructional planning platform, resources to build teacher capacity, and student-facing programs to teach academic language.
We are a fast-growing, mission-driven technology company partnering with over 1,500 school districts and more than 2 million current and former English Learners. Over the next five years, we plan to double the number of ELs we serve and drive measurable outcomes for students. Ellevation merged with Curriculum Associates in 2021 to accelerate impact for Multilingual Learners. Our company continues to operate independently and is well-capitalized to support our ambitious social and financial objectives.
Why Ellevation?
In addition to our great benefits and competitive salaries, here are some things that make us unique:
+ Mission-driven organization where team members are empowered to make a significant impact
+ Opportunities to join DEIB-focused groups and support building a culture of belonging
+ Professional development and growth opportunities
+ Company and team offsites in various cities across the United States
+ Collaborative workspace in the heart of Boston - a stone's throw from many central T stops (Downtown Crossing, Government Center, and Aquarium). Free snacks, beverages, and local organic fruit provided
+ Remote and in-person engagement opportunities, including happy hours, themed events, and competitions
+ Remote and in-person wellness programming to support team’s mental and physical wellbeing
Learn more about our team in our Culture Deck.
Here at Ellevation, we champion diversity, inclusion, equity, and belonging. We strive to build a team that reflects the diverse communities we serve. We are committed to creating an inclusive workplace that promotes and values a range of ideas and opinions.
We believe in building a culture where productivity can flourish, one that is empathetic, respectful, and inclusive. We are proud to have been recognized in prior years as “Best Tech Workplace for Diversity” by the Timmy Awards for investing in training around inclusive behaviors, microaggressions, unconscious bias, and fostering a culture of continuous learning and feedback across the company. We are encouraged by our progress, but there’s more work to be done.
Benefits – Benefits eligible employees (and qualifying dependents) are covered by medical, dental, vision, and basic life insurance. Employees can enroll in our company's 401(k) retirement plan and receive an employer match up to 50% on the first 7% of your contribution, with pre-tax and Roth options. Employees have access to flexible paid time off for vacations, sick and disability policy, additional 10 paid company holidays, 2 floating holidays and a winter office closure between Christmas and New Year's. In addition, we provide a generous parental leave benefit, back-up childcare or eldercare, and a variety of other perks to support the health and well-being of our employees.
Additional Information: Ellevation operates under Curriculum Associates, LLC, an Equal Opportunity Employer. Curriculum Associates, LLC will not discriminate against any employee or applicant for employment because of race, color, creed, religion, sex, national origin, age, marital status, veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, disability, genetic information, or any other category protected by law. Curriculum Associates, LLC will grant employment, without regard to race, color, creed, religion, sex, national origin, age, marital status, veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, disability, genetic information, or any other category protected by law. Such action shall include, but not be limited to, the following: employment, upgrading, demotion, transfer, recruitment or recruitment advertising, layoff or termination, rates of pay or other forms of compensation.
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