Product Lead — Next-Gen Product

Instrumental is used by the world's most admired AI and electronics brands like Nvidia, Cisco, and Meta to significantly reduce the $12T waste caused by downtime and mistakes every year in manufacturing. Our platform combines cloud analytics, edge computing on the factory floor, and proprietary AI to automate failure identification and resolution in real time, improving yield, quality, and time to market.

We are at a significant inflection point: the explosion in AI compute is driving a scale and speed of manufacturing that has never been seen before in this market, and Instrumental has become a key tool to help companies like NVIDIA meet demand. We are building entirely new capabilities — a next-gen agentic product that expands Instrumental beyond visual inspection into the full manufacturing data stack.

Instrumental is looking for a Product Lead to be embedded with our most strategic customers, turn product vision into a plan, and drive that plan into shipped product alongside a tech lead and small engineering team. You will work in close partnership with a tech lead — you bring the customer reality and problem decomposition, they bring the technical possibility, and the best solutions come from the intersection. You'll also work closely with engineers and other team members in your pod, but this partnership is the core of how your pod operates.

You'll work closely with the CPO on product vision and strategy, then own turning that into a plan and driving execution. You'll decompose big problems into shippable pieces, stay close to customer truth, and make daily judgment calls that keep your pod moving fast. Traditional PM artifacts like PRDs are replaced by direct collaboration with your tech lead and concise prompts that communicate intent to both people and AI agents. You'll be expected to set up and use AI agents to handle work like backlog management, writing user stories, and coordination — freeing you to focus on the highest-value work: problem decomposition, customer truth, judgment, and shipping fast iterations that deliver real value.

Your goal is to move from prototype through GA as quickly as possible. You are measured by customer outcomes and how quickly you ship iterations that validate product direction.

This role reports directly to the CPO.

We're Looking For Someone Who Is

• A problem decomposer — you take a big, ambiguous problem from the exec team or a customer and break it into smaller pieces that a small team can ship in days, not months. This is your core skill.
• Customer-embedded — comfortable on the factory floor, in the customer's ops center, or wherever the real workflow lives. You don't just visit customers; you live in their world enough to know when a solution actually changes their workflow versus when they're being polite.
• A strong partner to technical co-owners — you co-design solutions with your tech lead, not hand off specs. You have opinions about what to build and can hold your own in technical conversations, even if you're not writing the code.
• Wired for fast iteration — you ship small, validate quickly, and course-correct. You'd rather ship something imperfect this week than something polished next month.
• Strong at turning vision into plan into execution — you take a strategic direction, figure out what needs to happen, and drive it through to shipped product.
• AI-forward — using AI tools daily for research, analysis, prototyping, and coordination. This is an evaluation criterion, not a nice-to-have.
  
  

Reasons you should *not* join Instrumental:

• You've never worked at a startup before
• You expect a 9-5 (we have a global customer base and operations)
• You want a remote job
• Ambiguity and urgency stress you
• You want to do pure research/discovery without shipping — this role ships iterations weekly
  
  

Core Missions

• Turn product vision and strategy into a concrete plan, then decompose that plan into smaller, shippable pieces that your pod can tackle iteratively.
• Own your pod's outcomes while collaborating with your tech lead — together you design solutions, make tradeoff decisions, sequence work, and ship.
• Be forward-deployed with your design partner customer — spend real time in their environment, build custom solutions that solve their specific problems, then work to scale what works into repeatable product. Be in the factory, on the calls, in the data.
• Ship small iterations that deliver value consistently — this is how we validate product direction. Speed of validated learning is the metric.
• Make daily judgment calls on scope and priority without escalating — if the CPO becomes a bottleneck for your pod, the system is broken.
• Use AI for coordination, documentation, and task management — freeing your time for the work that actually matters: problem decomposition, customer truth, and judgment.
  
  

Requirements

• 5 years of experience in a role that required breaking down complex, ambiguous problems and delivering solutions with a small team — product management, forward-deployed engineering, solutions engineering, technical program management, or founding a company.
• Deep comfort in manufacturing or adjacent industrial environments — you speak the language of quality engineers, line operators, and manufacturing managers. Or you've worked in a similarly complex operational domain and can learn manufacturing fast.
• Demonstrated ability to work in a tight partnership with engineering — co-designing solutions, not just writing requirements.
• Track record of shipping fast in ambiguous environments with minimal process overhead.
• Strong customer-facing skills — you've spent real time with customers in their environment, not just in conference rooms.
• AI-forward in how you work — using AI tools aggressively for your own productivity.
  
  

We’re a growing team that consistently works collaboratively, is supportive of each other, and is highly energized by the opportunity for large impact. We actively work to promote an inclusive environment, valuing passion and the ability to learn.

You’re encouraged to apply even if your experience doesn’t precisely match the job description!

The following is a representative annual base salary range for this position within the Bay Area: $170,000-228,000. In addition, job level & salary opportunity is evaluated through our interview process – we review experience, knowledge, skills, and abilities of each applicant.

Instrumental is very proud to offer a highly-rated variety of benefits including: Health, Vision, Dental, Public Transit/Commuter Plans, and Maternity/Paternity Leave.