Product Manager

Product Manager - Drone Technologies

The Role

The Product Manager will be responsible for shaping and managing product requirements for Occam's autonomous drone software and related capabilities in Ukraine.

You will work with users, field teams, engineering, product delivery, operations and senior stakeholders to understand what is needed, define what should be built, and make sure product decisions are grounded in operational reality.

This is a hands-on product role. You will not be writing strategy documents from a distance. You will be close to the users, the testing environment and the delivery team. You will need to understand the product, ask good questions, make difficult trade-offs and keep the team focused on the highest-value work.

You do not need to be the deepest technical expert in the room, but you do need to be technically curious, credible with engineers and able to turn complexity into clear product direction.

What You'll Own

Product discovery and user understanding

• Work directly with frontline users, field teams, partners and internal stakeholders to understand needs, problems and constraints.
• Capture operational feedback and turn it into clear product insights.
• Identify where the product is working, where it is failing, and where it needs to improve.
• Separate urgent user requests from underlying product needs.
• Maintain a clear understanding of the operating context in Ukraine.
• Make sure product decisions are grounded in real-world use, not assumptions.
  
  

Product requirements and prioritisation

• Own and maintain product requirements for assigned capabilities.
• Translate user needs into clear problem statements, product requirements, acceptance criteria and delivery priorities.
• Work with engineering and product delivery to break down requirements into actionable work.
• Prioritise based on user value, operational urgency, technical feasibility, risk and delivery effort.
• Make trade-offs visible and help the team make good decisions quickly.
• Ensure the team understands why the work matters, not just what needs to be done.
  
  

Roadmap and product direction

• Contribute to the product roadmap for Occam's autonomous drone software and related products.
• Maintain a clear view of upcoming priorities, dependencies and decisions.
• Work with the CPO and wider product team to align Ukraine product needs with company-level strategy.
• Balance short-term field needs with longer-term product direction.
• Help identify product opportunities based on field feedback, testing results and partner engagement.
• Keep the roadmap practical, focused and connected to delivery reality.
  
  

Testing, feedback and iteration

• Work closely with field testing, engineering and product delivery teams to validate product changes.
• Support test planning by defining expected outcomes, acceptance criteria and user value.
• Review test results and help decide what needs to change next.
• Ensure lessons from testing are captured and fed back into product requirements.
• Support a fast rhythm of build, test, learn and improve.
• Help ensure the product becomes more useful, reliable and deployable over time.
  
  

Cross-functional collaboration

• Work closely with engineering, product delivery, operations, procurement, security and leadership.
• Act as a bridge between users and technical teams.
• Make sure engineers have the context they need to build the right thing.
• Support product delivery colleagues with clear priorities, requirements and decision-making.
• Communicate product priorities, progress, risks and trade-offs clearly to stakeholders.
• Create clarity when the environment is messy, fast-moving or uncertain.
  
  

Security, confidentiality and operational judgement

• Work within Occam's security, confidentiality and operational protocols at all times.
• Handle sensitive information with care and discretion.
• Understand the security implications of product decisions, user feedback and documentation.
• Support appropriate documentation for assurance, client engagement and internal decision-making.
• Escalate risks early and clearly.
• Operate with the judgement required in a defence-tech environment.
  
  

About You

You are a practical product person who wants to work close to real users and real problems.

You are comfortable with ambiguity, pressure and fast-changing priorities. You do not need everything to be neat before you act, but you do bring clarity to the work around you.

You are curious, organised and able to ask the questions that get to the heart of the problem. You can work with engineers without pretending to be one. You can speak to users without turning every request into a feature. You can challenge senior stakeholders when the product needs it.

You understand that in this environment, product management is not about beautifully maintained backlogs or long discovery cycles. It is about making sure the team builds what matters, learns quickly, and gets capability to the people who need it.

No defence experience? That is okay!

Required Experience

• Experience as a Product Manager, Product Owner, Technical Product Manager or similar.
• Experience working with technical products, ideally involving software, hardware, robotics, autonomy, aerospace, drones, defence technology or another complex technical environment.
• Strong ability to gather user needs and translate them into clear product requirements.
• Experience working closely with engineering teams.
• Strong prioritisation, problem-solving and decision-making skills.
• Ability to manage competing demands in a fast-moving environment.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills.
• Comfortable working with sensitive information and confidential stakeholders.
• Based in Ukraine and eligible to work in Ukraine.
  
  

Desirable Experience

• Experience in defence, military technology, UAVs, robotics, autonomous systems or mission-critical software.
• Experience working with frontline users, field teams or operational environments.
• Familiarity with drone operations, loitering munitions, one-way UAVs or battlefield technology.
• Experience working with Ukrainian, NATO, UK, EU or allied defence stakeholders.
• Understanding of secure product delivery, export control, sensitive documentation or classified environments.
• Experience in a startup or scale-up environment.
• Ukrainian language skills.
• Strong English communication skills, as Occam's working language is English.
  
  

Clearance, Location and Travel Requirements

• Must be based in Ukraine.
• Must be eligible to work in Ukraine.
• Must be able to travel within Ukraine when required.
• Must be willing and able to travel internationally when needed.
• Must be eligible to obtain and maintain relevant national security clearance where required.
• Existing defence, government or NATO-related clearance would be advantageous.
• Must be comfortable working in a highly confidential defence-tech environment.
  
  

Personal Attributes

• Practical, calm and product-focused.
• Curious about users, technology and operational context.
• Comfortable with ambiguity, pressure and changing priorities.
• Clear communicator with strong judgement.
• Discreet, trustworthy and security-aware.
• Able to challenge constructively.
• Credible with technical and non-technical stakeholders.
• Focused on outcomes rather than process for its own sake.
• Able to turn messy inputs into clear product direction.
  
  

Why This Role

Most Product Manager roles are about building features.

This one is about building capability.

You will work close to the people using Occam's technology in Ukraine and help shape products that need to perform in serious, real-world conditions. The work is sensitive, fast-moving and operationally important.

If you want a tidy product role with fixed requirements, long timelines and distance from the user, this is probably not it.

If you want to help turn field need into product direction, and product direction into capability that matters, this is the role.