The posting
Job Title: Senior Product Manager Department: Product Location: Sheffield or London Working Pattern: Hybrid, includes 3 days each week in the office Contract Type: Full Time, Permanent Salary: Up to £100,000 per annum At Tes we are on a mission to power schools and enable great teaching worldwide, by delivering EdTech solutions that give educators the tools to succeed. From safeguarding and compliance to staff and pupil management, our innovative and flexible software and services help teachers and school leaders worldwide to provide the best education to millions of children. With more than 13 million educators in our community, combined with our working relationships with 25,000 schools in over 100 countries, we have been making a difference for over 100 years. Role overview We are looking for an experienced product leader to own one of our value streams end-to-end. You will set its strategy, own its commercial performance, decide how we invest across a portfolio of products, and lead the go-to-market and lifecycle decisions that turn that investment into measurable value for schools and teachers. This is a broad role. You will own a defined value stream - a group of related products serving a coherent set of customer needs - rather than a single product. You will set direction over a rolling two-to-three year horizon, make explicit choices about what Tes will and will not do, and be accountable for what that produces. You will work through Product Managers and Product Owners, who own delivery within the outcomes and guardrails you set, and alongside partners in Marketing, Sales, Customer Success, Operations and Finance. You will hold real decision authority within agreed commercial, technical and regulatory guardrails, and you will be expected to use it. Tes is transforming how it builds and runs products. This role sits at the centre of that, with the scope to shape a significant part of the company and the EdTech market it serves. What you will own Strategy and commercial ownership
Set a clear strategy for your value stream: an honest diagnosis, explicit choices about where to play and how to win, and stated non-goals. Own the commercial performance of the value stream - ARR across new business, cross-sell and expansion; retention; cost-to-serve; and how capacity is invested across the portfolio. Own the forecast for your stream, explain variance, and act on it. Connect strategy to annual objectives with measures that show whether it is working.
Customer and market insight
Build a current, segmented understanding of users, buyers and decision-makers across your value stream. Keep a live view of the market, competitors and substitutes, and what they mean for your choices. Combine qualitative and quantitative evidence, be clear about confidence and uncertainty, and let the evidence change your mind in public.
Prioritisation and investment
Frame competing opportunities across products and apply explicit criteria consistently, making the opportunity cost visible. Allocate finite capacity across growth, retention, optimisation, risk, platform health and future options. Balance near-term commitments against long-term advantage, and negotiate cross-product and platform dependencies to a conclusion. Make assumptions and risks explicit, record the rationale, and go back afterwards to check whether the expected value arrived.
Go-to-market and value realisation
Define the target segment, proposition and positioning with your commercial partners. Orchestrate one integrated go-to-market plan across Product, Marketing, Sales, Customer Success and Operations, with named owners and a real readiness bar. Build evidence-led pricing and packaging recommendations. Own adoption and commercial performance after launch, and lead the correction when the numbers do not move. Lead optimisation, consolidation, migration and retirement decisions as actively as you lead launches.
Cross-functional leadership
Set clear outcomes, investment envelopes and guardrails for Senior Product Owners - and then leave them room to lead delivery. Align senior stakeholders, handle disagreement well, and decide when consensus is not available. Create narratives that work for a squad and for an executive audience, and make sure agreed actions actually close.
What will you need to succeed? Experience
Substantial product management experience in a complex or multi-product SaaS environment. A track record of owning outcomes across more than one product or team. Experience leading initiatives that spanned several functions and genuinely changed a business trajectory. Evidence of decisions taken under commercial pressure, and of going back to see what they produced.
Knowledge
SaaS business models and the drivers behind recurring revenue, retention and cost-to-serve. Portfolio prioritisation and capacity allocation. Product discovery and how to judge the quality of evidence. Go-to-market across marketing, sales, customer success and operations. Pricing and packaging. Product lifecycle work including migration and retirement.
Skills
You set direction under ambiguity and are willing to say what you are not doing. You use evidence to change your own mind, visibly. You make decisions when consensus is not available and hold them under challenge. You communicate the same message consistently to a squad and to an executive. You delegate real authority and resist taking delivery back when it gets difficult.
Qualifications
No formal qualification is required. Product, scaled agile, user-centred design and product analytics training are all useful, and none of them substitutes for evidence of the capabilities above.
Why this role is worth your time
Real scope. A whole value stream, a portfolio of products, and a two-to-three year horizon rather than a quarterly backlog. Real ownership. Commercial accountability for the result, and the decision authority to act on it. Work that matters. Everything Tes builds ends up in the hands of teachers and schools. A function being rebuilt. You will help set how product works at Tes, not inherit someone else’s finished machine.
What do you get in return?
25 days annual leave rising to 30 5% pension after probation State of the art offices Access to a range of benefits via My Benefits World Free eye care cover Life Assurance Cycle to Work Scheme EAP (Employee assistance programme) Quarterly Tes Socials Access to an extensive Learning and Development menu
Who are Tes? Tes is a global Edtech leader, on a mission to empower schools and educators to deliver impactful, inspiring learning experiences worldwide. We understand the unique challenges faced by schools, and our ecosystem is specifically designed to address these needs head-on. Our intuitive technology streamlines complex tasks, enhances learning experiences, and alleviates the administrative burdens that often overwhelm schools. By working closely with schools, we provide up-to-date resources, expert guidance, and a technology ecosystem dedicated to innovation and excellence in education. Whether simplifying administrative workflows, creating dynamic classrooms, or advancing professional development, Tes is the trusted partner for schools worldwide. Join the hundreds of schools already benefiting from the Tes ecosystem. Together, we empower educators to achieve more, ensuring every student thrives in a supportive, well-managed learning environment. With Tes, excellence in education is not just a goal - it's a sustainable and rewarding reality. For more information about Tes, our products, and our team, visit: www.tes.com.
