Technical Product/Project Manager — EMS Platform (Energy Sector)

Our partner operates an Energy Management System (EMS) platform sitting at the intersection of physical/technical infrastructure (PLCs, inverters, telemetry) and complex energy-market realities (DSO/TSO requirements, balancing, curtailment, billing). As their engineering team scales rapidly from 3 to 10+ professionals, they need a single, highly competent hybrid PM/BA-adjacent professional to translate between the energy domain and engineering, drive delivery frameworks, and own the product backlog lifecycle — working in close, continuous partnership with the Founder.

Main Responsibilities
Continuous Product Discovery & Validation (30%)

• Partner continuously with the Founder to capture early-stage feature hypotheses, market signals, and commercial targets
• Lead rapid prototyping initiatives, putting feature concepts in front of diverse users and stakeholders
• Run ongoing feedback loops to ensure feature concepts hit real customer pain points and accelerate sales velocity
• Translate discovery insights directly into roadmap priorities and macro-level requirements

High-Level Backlog Ownership & PM ↔ BA Tandem (30%)

• Own and prioritize the high-level product backlog, decomposing validated milestones into structured epics
• Act as the direct operational counterpart to the Business Analyst — setting targets for spec engineering and reviewing specs for commercial alignment
• Manage operational modes: loose, fluid boundaries for Rapid Validation Mode vs. strict boundary locks for Stabilization Mode

Project Management & Delivery Execution (40%)

• Drive execution rhythm across all engineering streams (Infrastructure, Cybersecurity, Backend, Frontend, SRE) for a predictable release cadence
• Monitor development velocity against AI agentic pipeline capacity (e.g., CrewAI, LangGraph) used for boilerplate generation, UI prototyping, and test automation; justify team expansion only when automation limits are reached
• Serve as final commercial gatekeeper, verifying that features built via human-agent collaboration satisfy original business logic and user needs before release

Mandatory Requirements
Must-have

• 6+ years as a Technical Project/Product Manager in the energy domain or another complex, regulated domain (logistics, telecom routing, industrial automation)
• Proven track record running continuous discovery pipelines and converting B2B user feedback into strategic backlog decisions
• Spec-driven, AI-aware mindset — comfortable with contract-first development and clear high-level boundaries for both BAs and autonomous agents
• Technical fluency — can read API docs, understand data models, write baseline SQL, and communicate with engineers without an interpreter
• Professional English (B2/C1 preferred)

Nice-to-have

• Hands-on experience with workflow automation, rapid UX prototyping, or LLM agentic orchestration (CrewAI, LangGraph)
• Awareness of energy sector principles (grid topologies, balancing markets, peak shaving, telemetry)
• Exposure to regulatory/cybersecurity frameworks in critical infrastructure (NIS2, IEC 62443)
• Native Romanian fluency (regional market/regulatory context)

Red flags

• Cannot hold a meaningful architecture discussion with engineering leads
• Rigid — can’t shift between Rapid Validation Mode and Stabilization Mode
• “Process-first” management, scribe-style PM work, treating engineers as task-takers, or analysis paralysis

We offer

• Format: Remote
• Search geography: Moldova, Romania, Ukraine
• Direct, continuous partnership with the Founder — a central strategic role, not a downstream execution function
• High-impact position at the core of a scaling team (3 → 10+ engineers), acting as the primary filter against technical debt and requirement drift
• Exposure to a cutting-edge, AI-agent-augmented delivery paradigm (Spec-Driven Development, CrewAI, LangGraph)