Job Description:
Product Manager
The role
We’re looking for a Product Manager to own a product area end to end: working out what to build, getting it built well, and making sure customers use it. You’ll also line manage one experienced Product Manager.
Gladstone has been transforming leisure management software for over 40 years. Our platforms power bookings, memberships and payments for councils, universities, trusts and leisure operators across the UK and Ireland. Our purpose is simple: getting more people, more active, more often.
You’ll take a problem from first customer conversation, through discovery and delivery, to launch and adoption. Then you’ll measure whether it worked.
You’ll thrive here if you’re curious about customers, comfortable making trade-offs, and judge yourself by outcomes rather than releases.
Where you’ll sit
You’ll report to the Chief Product Officer and join a small, collaborative Product team where some Product Managers manage others. You’ll partner day to day with an agile squad of engineers, QA and design, and work closely with Sales, Marketing, Customer Success, Support, Professional Services and Finance.
What you’ll do
Discovery: decide what’s worth building
Run regular customer conversations, site visits and validation sessions with operators, from front-of-house staff to senior leadership.
Use usage data, support trends, sales feedback and market and competitor insight to find and size problems.
Build the business case for significant investments and present it to senior stakeholders.
Weigh one customer’s request against what the wider customer base needs, and favour scalable, reusable solutions.
Delivery: get the right thing built well
Own and prioritise the roadmap and backlog for your product area, balancing customer value, commercial priorities and technical considerations.
Turn problems into clear, outcome-focused requirements and user stories, and refine them with the squad.
Work daily with engineering, QA and design: join planning, refinement and reviews, and make scope decisions quickly.
Champion user experience and self-service, so solutions are simple for operators and their members.
Spot and manage risks, dependencies and compliance needs, and communicate them early.
Coordinate with third-party and partner development teams, influencing without direct authority.
Go to market: make sure it lands
Plan launches with Marketing, Sales, Customer Success, Support and Professional Services, so every team is ready on day one.
Shape positioning and messaging, and equip Sales with clear value propositions and demos.
Make sure release notes, Knowledge Base articles and training materials are accurate and ready.
Across all three
Provide clear updates on progress, priorities and outcomes to the executive team and wider business.
Use AI responsibly in your own work, and consider where it can improve every feature you own.
Line management
Line manage one experienced Product Manager, coaching and mentoring them on Gladstone’s products, customers and ways of working.
Work alongside them as a peer on delivery.
Align goals, priorities and delivery updates with the CPO and other product leads.
What you’ll need to succeed
Experience as a Product Manager, Product Owner or in a similar role in B2B software or SaaS.
A track record of taking products or features from idea to launch, including discovery work, not only delivery.
Hands-on experience working with agile development teams and owning a backlog.
Confidence talking to customers and turning what you hear into clear problems and priorities.
A commercial mindset: you can build a business case and make trade-offs on value, cost and effort.
Strong written and verbal communication, adjusted for technical and non-technical audiences.
Experience coaching, mentoring or line managing others.
Why join Gladstone
You’ll join a collaborative Product team shaping leisure management technology used by councils, universities, trusts and leisure operators across the…