Jake Savin’s Résumé

Jake Savin | Seattle, WA | +1 (415) 307-1556

Summary

Passionate, veteran program/product manager for innovative, consumer-facing technology companies that build best-in-class user experiences spanning web, desktop, and mobile applications and platforms. I provide the leadership and technical depth needed to bring projects in on time, and on budget.

I bring to the table uniquely broad product development experience spanning software engineering, interaction design, program management, and testing over the course of nearly two decades.

Since the 1990’s, I have been bringing innovative and successful software products to market, including early DVD authoring systems, web content and development platforms, blogging and podcasting applications, IM and online communication, and mobile apps for iOS and Android devices.

Core Strengths

  • Natural team leader focused on group excellence, with great communication skills, a strong desire to maximize and grow individuals, and the empathy to back it up.
  • Cross-functional collaborator with a rare breadth of experience across software engineering, project/program management, UX design, people management, and strategy.
  • Consistent product and customer focus, backed up by broad experience with a wide range of teams, project methodologies, technologies, and platforms.

Skills and Expertise

  • Agile, waterfall, and hybrid projects
  • Team building
  • People management and mentoring
  • User experience and interaction design
  • Functional and technical specification
  • Distributed systems and APIs
  • Test and build automation
  • Software performance optimization

Professional Experience

Senior Technical Program Manager / Amazon Music / 2020-present

Managing Amazon Music voice-based customer experiences, alignment with non-voice customer experience, and worldwide expansion of voice feature availability.

Senior TPM / Rover.com / 2019-2020

Managed strategic initiatives in developing and improving Rover.com’s backend architecture and API, and improving cross-team collaboration.

Senior Technical Project Manager, Architect / L4 Mobile (acquired by Globant) / 2015-2019

Managed multiple development teams to deliver consumer apps for iPhone, iPad, Android phones and tablets, game consoles, and “set-top” devices for multiple Fortune 500 clients.

Director of Project Management / Black Pixel / 2013-2014

Built and managed the PM team for Black Pixel’s rapidly growing iOS and Android mobile app agency, reporting to C-level principals. Clients are mainly large consumer-facing companies in the media, sports, and retail markets. Project teams up to 25 people.

Product Owner / Hitachi Data Systems / 2012-2013

One of four product owners in a 40 person agile startup team, in the competitive and fast-moving enterprise private cloud market. Software integrated with VMware to manage physical and virtual datacenter infrastructure, and included web and native UI, JSON API, and command-line interface. Customers: Fortune 1000, and large service providers.

Program Manager / Microsoft / 2006-2012

Technical program manager on Windows Live client platform, supporting eight application teams, including Messenger, Mail, SkyDrive, Photo Gallery, Movie Maker and others. Managed teams of 3-6 dev/test engineers, with “v-teams” up to 35. Shipped multiple releases to over 350M users, in 90+ languages.

Senior Developer / UserLand Software / 2000-2006

Developed web applications and developer tools for UserLand’s groundbreaking Manila, Radio UserLand, and Frontier platform. Company and products were early influencers: blogs, RSS, podcasting, and web standards.

Previous Experience:

1999-2000: Mac PublishingWeb CMS Developer—Extended in-house CMS and search service with new features, and spearheaded move to database-backed content and rendering systems.

1996-1999: Sonic SolutionsBuild Engineer • Designed and delivered in-house build automation farm, migrated company to new source code control system, trained and supported development staff, and owned branch management. • SDET • Developed first in-house test automation tools, improved dev/test engineering process and enhanced bug database.

1992-1996: Recording artistRoadrunner Records (Amsterdam) • Bassist, recording engineer, guitar tech, and gig-wrangler with Painting Over Picasso, a 7-piece indie rock band. We played all original music at ~300 shows with audiences from 2 to 20,000 people, and released one album and two singles.

Education

  • iOS and Mac Application Development Certificate, University of Washington, 2013
  • BA music composition, informal minor in cognitive psychology, Reed College, 1992
  • Extension Physics (not for credit), Harvard University, 1986

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