Principal Product Manager, Core Experiences

By the Numbers:

• Named #1 best software for small business of 2024 by G2
• 2,700+ employees in the United States, Canada, Mexico, and Turkiye and growing 
• Over $500M in annual revenue 
• The SMB market is large (and growing!) with huge opportunities for Gusto to make an incredible impact for SMBs 
• There are 6.2M employers in the US, 98% have fewer than 100 employees ⁽¹⁾ 
• 550,000 new businesses are created each year in the US ⁽¹⁾ 

What Product Management is like at Gusto:

• We’re looking for high-autonomy, entrepreneurial Product Managers to come build high-impact solutions for small businesses and their employees. We believe in high-ownership Product Managers who operate like business owners - owning an entire roadmap end to end and shipping product all the way from strategy through to the nitty gritty details (some describe this kind of role as a “GM” type role).
• Our Product team is lean, which means you’ll have a high degree of impact and ownership. 
• We’re here to serve small and medium businesses. Gusto has a strong mission-driven culture, and we care deeply about lifting up these business owners. 

About the Team: 

The Core Experiences Platform teams encompass the foundational data models, APIs, and UX concepts (or “commons”) that teams across Gusto leverage to build high quality, cohesive experiences at scale. We think globally about how to craft a thoughtful system of apps and experiences — considering the full stack — so that App teams can focus more locally on solving their unique jobs to be done. This work is critical to ensuring that Gusto functions and feels like one integrated, connected experience, where concepts, data, and UX patterns have shared meaning and where customers can build their own understanding and confidence because the experience is predictable, consistent, easy to use and feels custom-built for the unique needs of their business.

This role will support the dedicated Gusto Design Systems team which sits within the Core Experiences group, while also taking on strategic initiatives spanning beyond Design Systems.

Here’s what you’ll do day-to-day: 

• Ownership: Craft a holistic vision grounded in user needs and lead the long-term product strategy for our Design System as well as additional strategic Core Experience initiatives.
• North Star: Your goal is to enable internal gusto R&D teams to build end-to-end app experiences more quickly and consistently while also driving significant progress in strategic Core Experience initiatives.
• Collaborate: Work closely with Design, Engineering, Data, and peer product teams to drive the roadmap forward. You’ll also manage dependencies and mitigate roadblocks that could impact the design system's development or adoption.
• Problem Framing & Research: Use Design Thinking to reframe ambiguous problems and inject user-led validation early in the lifecycle.
• Roadmapping & Prioritization: Manage the system like a product, prioritize design impact and add new layers of insight while sequencing work and shipping iteratively.
• Innovation: Identify or take the lead on net-new strategic initiatives that need deeper innovation through systems thinking and develop concepts that lead to roadmap initiatives.
• Measure & Communicate: Define success metrics that reflect adoption, usage, system health, and UX impact. You will demonstrate how the system drives org-wide value—even when that value is indirect—and advocate for its role as a core platform investment.

Here’s what we're looking for: 

• 8+ years of direct product experience
• Demonstrated Platform experience and combination of systems thinking, user empathy, and vision-driven approach to Platform product management
• Experience driving cross-functional AI initiatives from inception
• Strong background in Design, UX, Design Systems or equivalent
• Proven track record of successfully leading complex projects from concept to launch
• Expertise in identifying and understanding patterns across interconnected systems
• Exceptional communication and interpersonal skills, with the ability to lead through influence and inspire cross-functional teams in high-stakes 

If you don't think you meet all of the criteria above but still are interested in the job, please apply. Nobody checks every box, and we're looking for someone excited to join the team.

Our cash compensation amount for this role is $181,000/yr to $223,000/yr in Denver & most major metro locations, and $212,000/yr to $262,000/yr for San Francisco, Seattle & New York. Final offer amounts are determined by multiple factors including candidate location, experience and expertise and may vary from the amounts listed above.

Where do PMs at Gusto work?

We have offices in Denver, San Francisco, and New York and have remote team members across the US and Canada. We are actively hiring for the following Centers of Gravity: Toronto, Canada, Atlanta, GA, Austin, TX, Chicago, IL, Denver, CO, Los Angeles, CA, Miami, FL, and Seattle, WA. Our open roles will specify on the careers page and in the job description where the position is eligible for work. 

 ⁽¹⁾ Business Applications with Planned Wages (www.census.gov)