How You’ll Make An Impact

We’re looking for a Program Manager to help power how innovation happens at ConnectDER.

In this role, you’ll lead the development and launch of new products while building the systems, tools, and processes that keep us operating at a best-in-class level. You’ll sit at the center of ideation, technology development, and portfolio strategy. You will connect ideas to execution and help the organization scale what works.

This is a highly impactful role for a strategic, technically minded leader who can navigate complexity, drive change, and bring people together to turn vision into reality.

Duties include: 

Program & Product Leadership

• Lead New Product Introduction (NPI) programs end-to-end, ensuring alignment to governance, timelines, cost targets, and best practices
• Drive New Technology Introduction (NTI) efforts to evaluate and integrate emerging technologies into future products
• Partner with Product Management to define requirements and ensure alignment with market needs, cost targets, and timelines
• Lead stage gate reviews and participate in design reviews with internal teams, suppliers, and customers

Process, Systems & Continuous Improvement

• Own and optimize the Arena PLM ecosystem, including process design, governance, and user training
• Oversee sustaining engineering and change management, ensuring a closed-loop system for requests and implementation
• Drive continuous improvement by refining development processes, tools, and workflows
• Capture lessons learned and lead post-mortems to strengthen future execution

Cross-Functional Execution & Delivery

• Coordinate cross-functional development and validation activities, including prototyping, testing, and certification
• Collaborate with Supply Chain to ensure timely procurement and management of prototype materials
• Support commercialization efforts during product launches in partnership with go-to-market teams

Communication & Stakeholder Management

• Communicate program status, risks, and tradeoffs clearly to stakeholders at all levels
• Provide program management guidance to cross-functional teams to support broader organizational initiatives
• Identify and resolve project risks, conflicts, and resource constraints

Leadership & External Collaboration

• Lead and influence cross-functional teams within a matrixed organization
• Manage relationships with external vendors, consultants, and partners

Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

Location & Travel: This is a full-time hybrid position requiring 3 days on-site at our Philadelphia office and up to 10% travel. 

Compensation: $105,000 - $115,000 annually, plus bonus and equity. 

What success looks like in your first 6 - 12 months

• Get up to speed on our current systems and frameworks
• Take full ownership of Arena PLM
• Lead and successfully execute key NPI programs
• Begin identifying and implementing process improvements

Who We’re Looking For 

Must-Haves

• 5 - 7 years leading and managing ideation, technology and product development in a fast-paced engineering environment
• History of successfully leading product development teams and activities from idea-to-launch
• Proven leadership skills and the ability to associate with all levels in the organization
• Proven success in establishing key performance indicators, metrics, and focus to drive product development best practices
• Advanced negotiation, problem solving, and interpersonal skills (presentation, written and oral) with the ability to communicate effectively with all levels of staff and management
• Comfort in operating in both agile and waterfall project methodologies, for both software and hardware development projects
• Experience using project management software (i.e. ClickUp, Microsoft Project, etc)

Nice-to-Haves 

• Advanced degree in a technical or business discipline
• Experience delivering solutions in the solar, renewable, and/or distributed energy Resource (DER) industry
• Lean, Six Sigma or other continuous improvement process experience
• Advanced knowledge of innovation tools (Roadmunk, ClickUp, PLM systems, PowerBI etc)

You’ll thrive in this role if you are:

• Proactive and highly organized with strong follow-through
• Comfortable with rapid change
• Curious and eager to learn, even outside your experience
• Emotionally intelligent and able to tailor your message to your audience
• Willing to take risks and bring solutions

If you’re someone who sees ambiguity as an opportunity, not a blocker, you’ll do well here.

Work Environment/Physical Demands: Must have the ability to work on a computer for extended periods of time with or without accommodation.

We’re looking for a Real-Time Firmware Engineer who wants to work on challenging, meaningful problems at the intersection of hardware, software, and clean energy.

This is not a maintenance role. You’ll be helping build a new product from the ground up and contributing directly to firmware that powers electrification, grid resiliency, and distributed energy resources (DERs).

If you’re someone who enjoys deep technical work, solving real-world problems, and seeing your code move from concept to deployed product, this role is built for you.

You will: 

• Play a hands-on role in designing and delivering real-time firmware for microcontroller-based systems
• Design, implement, and test real-time firmware for control, communications, and functional safety
• Contribute directly to product development from concept through release
• Collaborate closely with hardware, firmware, and software engineers in a highly integrated environment
• Develop requirements, specifications, and test strategies
• Debug and troubleshoot complex, timing-critical systems
• Support product deployment and help resolve real-world technical challenges

Work Environment/Physical Demands: Must have the ability to work on a computer for extended periods of time with or without accommodation. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

Location & Travel: This is a full-time hybrid position requiring 3 days on-site at our Philadelphia office and up to 5% travel. 

Compensation: $115,000 - $130,000 annually, plus bonus and equity. 

What Success Looks Like

First 90 Days

• Build a strong understanding of the product, system architecture, and problem space
• Develop a clear approach to implementing solutions

6 Months

• Independently own and deliver a meaningful portion of the product
• Contribute production-ready firmware to the system

12 Months

• Your work is validated, integrated, and released as part of the product

Who We’re Looking For 

Minimum Requirements 

• 5+ years experience as a Real-Time Firmware engineer designing, implementing, and testing embedded software/firmware for microcontrollers based products
• Professional experience developing software applications in C/C++
• Experience using RTOS to create software/firmware for multi-threaded, timing critical applications. Good understanding of timing budgets in critical systems
• Proficient with debugging/troubleshooting techniques, including JTAG Debuggers, trace analyzers, and use of electronics lab equipment such as Multimeters, Oscilloscopes, Logic analyzers, and Signal/Function Generators
• Professional experience using Source Control Management systems (e.g. Git)
• Understanding of static source code analysis tools/methods
• Experience in developing design documentation (requirements, flowcharts, data flow diagrams, state transition diagrams, etc.)
• Basic understanding of electronics concepts

Preferred Qualifications 

• Developing embedded firmware for functional safety (electrical, automotive, or medical)
• Electric meters, circuit breakers, or AC power management preferred
• Working in regulated industries and creating certification documentation
• Familiarity with IEC 60730, IEC 61508, or ISO 26262 preferred
• ARM processors (preferably Cortex-R), including execution models, interrupt management, and DMA
• TI AM64xx experience preferred
• Authoring low-level drivers and SOC management (UART, SPI, I2C, DDR4, Secure Boot, etc.)
• Implementing serial interfaces; CANbus or Modbus knowledge preferred
• Digital Signal Processing
• Remote communication protocols (RF, Wi-Fi, Cellular, Bluetooth)

You’re the ideal candidate if:

• You come in with a strong foundation: you’re not learning embedded systems from scratch
• You’re adaptable and comfortable with evolving requirements
• You bring informed opinions, but stay open and collaborative
• You can both write great code and explain it clearly
• You enjoy working on a team that solves problems together

You may not be a fit if:

• You’re a web or cloud engineer without deep firmware experience
• You prefer highly structured, slow-moving environments
• You struggle with collaboration or communicating technical ideas