Director, Product Management - Search & Match

We are looking for a Director, Product Management – Search & Match to shape and drive our core algorithm, ranking, discovery, and recommendation product strategies. Reporting to the VP of AI & Platform Products, you will act as a key product and business partner, translating complex data systems into high-impact executive narratives, commercial growth levers, and seamless marketplace experiences.

This role requires an experienced leader who blends strong business sense with high-impact executive presentation skills to align senior stakeholders, optimize platform resource allocation, and lead cross-functional product teams.

Search & Match is the core intelligence engine powering our platform’s two-sided marketplace. It drives both sides of the matching equation: enabling job seekers to discover relevant roles (B2C) and helping employers and recruiters surface qualified candidates and resumes (B2B). These intelligent discovery mechanics directly power overall engagement, retention, and enterprise platform adoption.

About this team

Our mission is to provide the best-in-class job search tools that drive the best outcomes for job seekers and provide long term value for our brand. This team works cross-functionally with Engineering, Analytics, Marketing, Design, and Finance to achieve business goals.

What you'll do

• Shape and Drive Two-Sided Marketplace Strategy
• Align Strategy to Business Impact: Define and own the multi-year strategy and roadmap for Search & Match, directly linking algorithmic advancements to core business outcomes, enterprise customer value, and job seeker engagement.
• Dual-Sided Marketplace Discovery: Drive search, ranking, and recommendation strategies across both consumer-facing search (job seekers discovering opportunities) and B2B search mechanics (employers and sourcers searching resume databases and candidate pipelines).
• Resource & ROI Stewardship: Govern functional team capacity, compute/infrastructure investments, and feature prioritization—balancing trade-offs between performance, accuracy, and operational efficiency.
• Market & Competitive Positioning: Evaluate industry trends in search, vector embeddings, and machine learning to position our dual-sided matching engine as a premier market differentiator.
• Executive Influence & Stakeholder Alignment
• Executive Storytelling & Presentation: Translate complex search performance, algorithmic models, and marketplace dynamics into clear, compelling narratives and board-ready presentations for executive leadership.
• Build Cross-Functional Coalitions: Drive strategic consensus across Engineering, Data Science, UX, Enterprise GTM, and Consumer Operations—ensuring alignment on roadmap sequencing and operational trade-offs.
• Lead Through Change: Guide functional teams through strategic pivots, shifting organizational priorities, and technology evolutions with structured rationale and strong clarity.
• Drive Operational Excellence & Execution
• Orchestrate Execution at Scale: Lead cross-functional product squads across match scoring, candidate indexing, search relevance, and recommendation feeds to ensure predictable, high-velocity delivery.
• Systems & Marketplace Metrics: Establish clear performance metrics to measure search precision, recall, candidate-to-job match relevance, search latency, and reciprocal marketplace liquidity.
• Culture of Experimentation: Oversee rigorous A/B testing and experimentation protocols to continuously refine discovery algorithms for both candidate and recruiter touchpoints.
• Build and Develop High-Performing Teams
• Mentorship & Talent Pipeline: Coach and develop Product Managers, instilling strong business sense, strategic thinking, user empathy, and executive communication skills.
• Evolve Product Rituals: Establish operational frameworks, governance rituals, and decision-making standards that foster velocity and transparency across teams.

What you'll need

8–10+ years of experience in product management, with significant experience leading two-sided marketplaces, search engines, recommendation systems, or match platforms.

Proven Executive Presence: Exceptional presentation and storytelling abilities—able to influence executive leadership, translate complex technical topics into business impact, and drive organizational consensus.

Strong Business Sense: Deep commercial intuition with the ability to connect algorithmic performance (relevance, precision, candidate conversion) directly to platform health and client retention.

Two-Sided Marketplace Expertise: Proven track record of balancing dual stakeholder needs—solving for both B2C consumer discovery and B2B enterprise/recruiter search workflows.

Strategic & Resource Allocation Mastery: Experience shaping functional product strategies, managing engineering trade-offs, and maximizing investment ROI without direct P&L management.

Cross-Functional Leadership: Skilled at building trust and alignment across matrixed organizations, including Data Science, Machine Learning, UX, and Commercial teams.

People Management Experience: Demonstrated success coaching, mentoring, and leading product managers to drive team growth and operational excellence.

Bachelor’s degree in a relevant technical, quantitative, or business field (or equivalent practical experience).

What's good to have

Direct experience presenting strategic roadmaps and performance insights to C-suite executives and board members.

Background in recruitment technology, two-sided talent marketplaces, resume indexing systems, or professional networking platforms.

Familiarity with modern AI/ML search paradigms, Large Language Models (LLMs) for semantic matching, or vector search technologies.

Experience scaling product rituals and decision frameworks within high-growth software organizations.

Additional Pay Ranges

All other locations:

$170,000-$200,000

SF/NY/Seattle

: $190,000-$240,000

IL/TX

: $180,000-$220,000

About Bold

We Transform Work Lives

As an established global organization, BOLD helps people find jobs. Our story is one of growth, success, and professional fulfillment. We create digital products that have empowered millions of people in 180 countries to build stronger resumes, cover letters, and CVs. The result of our work helps people interview confidently, finding the right job in less time. Our employees are experts, learners, contributors, and creatives.

We Celebrate And Promote Diversity And Inclusion

We value our position as an Equal Opportunity Employer. We hire based on qualifications, merit, and our business needs. We don't discriminate regarding race, color, religion, gender, pregnancy, national origin or citizenship, ancestry, age, physical or mental disability, veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, marital status, genetic information, or any other applicable characteristic protected by law.

Under San Francisco's Fair Chance Ordinance, qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records will be considered for the position.