Manager, Localization Program Management Amazon
Seattle, WA

Job Description

The Seller, Vendor, and Brand Support team strives to make Amazon the best place for Sellers, Vendors and Brands to reach customers, driven by the experience and support we provide them in growing their businesses locally and globally. Within this group the Seller Experience - Content Management team plays a key role in supporting these customers by driving the development of high-quality, user-centered content for Sellers that partner with Amazon and for the associates who help Sellers when they contact Seller, Vendor, and Brand Support. We set the tone for the global business by creating great content across 17 primary languages.

The successful candidate will manage a small team of localization program managers. This includes regular meetings with direct reports and the global team / business stakeholders, resource planning/allocation, delivering programmatic goals, and manage the team's performance. Additionally, the candidate would also be expected to drive localization related programs from conception to delivery working in collaboration with stakeholders globally. This role requires an individual with excellent analytical abilities, project management skills and hands-on translation management system experience. The candidate must be a self-starter, with strong attention to detail, capable of diving deep, able to deal with ambiguities and work in a fast-paced and dynamic environment. Great interpersonal skills, strong verbal and written communication, time management, ability to multi-task efficiently, and openness to change are required. A passion for communicating effectively and a healthy sense of humor are essential to the role.

This team is currently looking for an experienced Localization Program Manager. This position is an exceptional opportunity for a creative, collaborative and highly motivated individual to manage a complex set of localization programs, processes and tools for a leading multinational organization.

The Localization Program Manager will be responsible for delivering and managing the end-to-end localization and translation required for new product and program launches, while also ensuring continuous improvement of our workflow for optimal end user success. To do this, s/he must be able to manage across numerous business models and create certainty out of ambiguity while having a firm grasp on the operational, financial, and technical aspects of the content development and localization required for each new and existing application. A successful candidate will be highly analytical, technical, resourceful, customer-focused, team-oriented, and will have an ability to work independently under time constraints to meet deadlines at scale. S/he will have a proven track record in using data to guide decisions, being able to prioritize, and acting upon the information received.

* Manage and develop a small team of dynamic localization program managers.
* Manage and own traditional localization program management tasks, such as, working with stakeholders to define localization scope and coordinate with language service providers (loc vendors), prepare localization handoffs and handbacks, and manage the localization process and support deployment of localized assets but not limited to technical and non-technical localization production tasks.
* Strive to dive deep and eager to become the subject matter expert when encountering new tools and technology
* Work with content creators, customer strategy owners, content infrastructure teams to define and streamline processes upstream and drive internationalization best practice.
* Work closely with localization engineering staff, as well as product and infrastructure engineers, owning the end to end localization process automation program management. This includes driving delivery schedule, requirements gathering from stakeholders, writing specs and hosting spec reviews, and UAT, etc.
* Design and implement "creative solutions" to improve the localization process.
* Work with corporate and international partners to understand and address localization pain points.

Basic qualifications

* 5+ years experience in people management
* 6+ years experience in Program Management
* 3+ years experience working in the localization field, or closely partner with and participate in localization and internationalization related work/activities
* Excellent English-language communication skills, both written and verbal
* Detail oriented, strong problem-solving, and organizational skills
* Good understanding of markup languages (html, XML, etc)
* Creating and managing KPIs
* Good understanding of localization CAT tool design and concept
* Hands-on experience with WorldServer, Trados, and other localization platforms & tools
* Can work independently, resourceful, and superb research and problem solving ability

Preferred qualifications

* Hands-on content tracking experience, including source assets and loc asset relationship tracking through relevant metadata
* Ability to comfortably and competently communicate technical concepts with engineers (coding is not required)
* Experience localizing or working with multi-media, training content and training management systems
* Globalization experience, especially content and/or software globalization design
* Fluency in at least one additional (human) language
* Hands-on experience as a translator is a plus
* Experience in people management
* Master degree or equivalent