Senior Program Manager

Who you are

• Bachelor’s degree in Engineering, Naval Architecture, or a related technical field
• 9+ years of experience in program management of large-scale production, shipbuilding, or complex defense development programs. Program Management experience of Unmanned Surface Vessels highly desirable
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills, with the ability to interface confidently with technical and non-technical audiences
• Demonstrated ownership of cost, schedule, and scope on programs of significant size and complexity
• Experience managing production at rate, including supply chain, build sequencing, and delivery of large or complex hardware systems highly desirable
• Proven ability to manage government or defense customers, contracts, and deliverables
• Willingness to travel up to 25% of the time
• Secret security clearance eligibility required, active preferred
• Prolonged periods of sitting at a desk and working on a computer
• Occasional standing and walking within the office
• Manual dexterity to operate a computer keyboard, mouse, and other office equipment
• Visual acuity to read screens, documents, and reports
• Occasional reaching, bending, or stooping to access file drawers, cabinets, or office supplies
• Lifting and carrying items up to 20 pounds occasionally (e.g., office supplies, packages)
• Can own a large, complex program end-to-end while balancing production throughput against mission flexibility
• Can connect production and configuration decisions to overall program cost, schedule, and mission outcomes
• Can translate evolving customer requirements into disciplined, executable program plans
• Leadership of high-performing, cross-functional, and distributed teams
• Established track record of clear, consistent, and correct communications with peers, leaders, and external stakeholders
• Comfort guiding customers through ambiguous or evolving requirements and shaping actionable solutions

What the job involves

• Saronic Technologies is seeking a Program Manager to own the execution and delivery of major shipbuilding programs
• Saronic’s shipbuilding capacity exists at our shipyard in Franklin, LA and Port Alpha in Brownsville, TX. The PM will manage large-scale production and is accountable for cost, schedule, scope, and customer outcomes from contract award through delivery and sustainment
• Saronic’s ships are built at production scale and fielded across a wide and evolving range of complex missions
• The Program Manager must pair deep expertise in large-scale shipbuilding and rate production with an instinct for modular kits, payloads, and mission-package integration—understanding how a common hull is configured, re-configured, and sustained to meet diverse customer needs. This role owns the balance between production throughput and mission flexibility
• The Program Manager serves as the primary customer-facing relationship owner. Partnering closely with the internal Saronic growth, engineering, production and quality teams, the right candidate brings the customer fluency to manage government stakeholders and contracts
• The PM should also have the acumen to make technical decisions aligned to the customer needs and contract requirements, and the programmatic discipline to deliver a large, complex platform at scale
• Own end-to-end execution of a commercial and/or Government Shipbuilding program, holding accountability for cost, schedule, scope, and quality from award through delivery and sustainment
• Serve as a leader and owner of the customer contract, deliverables, milestones, CDRLs, and contractual obligations
• Build and maintain the integrated program plan, aligning productions scheduled, engineering milestones, and integration timelines to customer commitments
• Drive risk and opportunity management across the program, escalating and resolving issues that threaten cost, schedule, or performance
• Report program health, forecasts, and decisions to Saronic leadership and customer stakeholders
• Partner with the Franklin and/or Port Alpha production team to plan and execute rate production large Ships (autonomous or manned), from long-lead procurement through hull construction, outfitting, and delivery
• Monitor build sequencing, work breakdown, and production milestones to protect throughput while meeting quality and acceptance criteria
• Monitor and mitigate production risks—supply chain, labor, tooling, and facility constraints—unique to large-vessel shipbuilding
• Coordinate with Quality and Production to ensure build configurations and acceptance events meet customer and contractual standards
• Own the configuration strategy for the ship class across a variety of mission packages, kits, and payloads on a common production hull
• Partner with Mission Package Integration Managers to plan integration of bespoke and commercial-off-the-shelf kits into the production and delivery flow
• Balance production standardization against mission-driven variance, protecting throughput while enabling flexibility
• Ensure integration timelines, dependencies, and configuration baselines are reflected in the master program plan
• Capture mission-package lessons learned and feed them back into production and product roadmaps
• Serve as the primary point of contact for customers, managing expectations, requirements, and relationships across the program lifecycle
• Elicit and clarify evolving mission needs, translating them into actionable program and technical direction
• Lead program reviews, delivery events, and technical exchanges with government stakeholders, operators, and evaluators
• Deliver clear, concise program updates and after-action reporting to leadership and customer audiences
• Direct and synchronize a cross-functional program team spanning Production, Engineering, Software, Mission Services, and Forward Deployed Engineering
• Partner with Technical Program Managers to align technical execution with programmatic commitments
• Make and defend tradeoff decisions across capability, schedule, cost, and risk
• Drive disciplined configuration management across vessels, kits, payloads, and software versions