Manager Program Management Jobs in Diamondhead, MS

Business Area Product Transition Manager

Business Operations / Program/Project Management

Position Summary

The Business Area Product Transition Manager is responsible for planning, coordinating, and driving the successful transition of strategic maritime products from Engineering into Production. This role serves as the central integrator across Engineering, Technology, Manufacturing, Supply Chain, Facilities, Quality, Programs, Contracts, Finance, and Sector leadership to ensure new products achieve production readiness and are successfully scaled to meet customer commitments and Business Area strategic objectives.

The position provides senior leadership for the Business Area's productization strategy, ensuring that transition activities remain synchronized, risks are actively managed, dependencies are resolved, and production milestones are achieved on schedule.

This role is critical to executing the Business Area Long Range Plan (LRP) and enabling the successful industrialization of maritime systems including Medium Uncrewed Surface Vessels (MUSVs), Small Uncrewed Surface Vessels (sUSVs), Uncrewed Underwater Vehicles (UUVs), Undersea Sensors & Infrastructure, Subsea and Surface vessel payloads, Maritime Communications Systems, related software systems, and future product lines.

Location: This position may be based at any of the following Leidos locations, with a preference for candidates who can be co-located with members of the team: St. Petersburg, FL; Long Beach, MS; Lynnwood, WA; Northern Virginia (NoVA); or Huntsville, AL.

Primary Responsibilities

• Lead the Business Area's product transition strategy from engineering development through production readiness.

• Develop and maintain integrated transition plans across multiple product lines.

• Coordinate execution activities across Engineering, Technology, Manufacturing, Supply Chain, Facilities, Quality, Programs, Contracts and Finance.

• Establish governance processes, milestones, and metrics to monitor productization progress.

• Identify schedule, resource, technical, manufacturing, and supply chain risks affecting production transition and drive mitigation strategies.

• Ensure manufacturing readiness activities are completed in alignment with production schedules.

• Facilitate cross-functional decision making to remove barriers and accelerate product transitions.

• Coordinate with Sector leadership to ensure alignment with enterprise productization initiatives and strategic priorities.

• Prepare executive-level status briefings, dashboards, and performance metrics.

• Track key milestones supporting Long Range Plan objectives and production growth targets.

• Drive accountability across functional organizations to ensure commitments are met.

• Support production planning activities including transition readiness reviews, production ramp planning, and manufacturing handoffs.

• Coordinate implementation of engineering changes affecting production schedules and product readiness.

• Identify opportunities to improve transition processes, governance, and organizational efficiency.

• Support strategic planning for future product introductions and production scaling.

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Engineering, Business, Operations Management, Program Management, or related field.

• 15+ years of progressively responsible experience in program management, operations, engineering, manufacturing, business operations, or product development.

• Experience leading complex cross-functional initiatives involving multiple stakeholders.

• Experience transitioning products from development into manufacturing or production environments.

• Experience within the defense, aerospace, maritime, or autonomous systems industries.

• Experience supporting DoD acquisition or production programs.

• Strong understanding of product lifecycle management and production readiness processes. PPM

• Demonstrated ability to manage complex schedules, dependencies, and competing priorities.

• Excellent executive communication and presentation skills.

• Strong analytical, organizational, and problem-solving abilities.

• Experience developing executive dashboards, metrics, and program reporting.

• U.S. Citizenship is required. Candidates must be eligible to obtain and maintain a Secret security clearance. An active clearance is not required to start employment but must be obtained as a condition of continued employment.

Preferred Qualifications

• Master's degree in Business, Engineering, or related discipline.

• PMP certification or equivalent program management certification.

• Familiarity with manufacturing readiness levels (MRLs), technology readiness levels (TRLs), and production planning.

• Knowledge of Lean, Six Sigma, or continuous improvement methodologies.

• Experience working in matrixed organizations.

If you're looking for comfort, keep scrolling. At Leidos, we outthink, outbuild, and outpace the status quo - because the mission demands it. We're not hiring followers. We're recruiting the ones who disrupt, provoke, and refuse to fail. Step 10 is ancient history. We're already at step 30 - and moving faster than anyone else dares.

The Leidos pay range for this job level is a general guideline onlyand not a guarantee of compensation or salary. Additional factors considered in extending an offer include (but are not limited to) responsibilities of the job, education, experience, knowledge, skills, and abilities, as well as internal equity, alignment with market data, applicable bargaining agreement (if any), or other law.