Senior Product Manager

Recruitment Information

This position is for the State of Hawaii, Department of Human Services, Med-QUEST Division. The location of the position will be based on where the selectee resides within the State.

Salary range for this position starts at $11,500 per month and is commensurate with education and experience.

If you have any questions regarding this non-civil service (exempt) position, please reach out to Meredith Nichols, Med-QUEST Division Administrator at mnichols@dhs.hawaii.gov.

The State Recruiting Office will refer all inquiries regarding this exempt position to the Department of Human Services, Human Resources Office, Recruitment and Examination Staff via email at bleong2@dhs.hawaii.gov.

Duties Summary

Med-QUEST, Hawaii's Medicaid program, provides healthcare coverage to just under 400,000 people in Hawaii's diverse community, including working families, children, older adults, and people with disabilities. New federal mandates introduced in 2025 through H.R. 1, including work requirements for expansion populations and a shift from annual to semi-annual eligibility redeterminations, create urgency and opportunity for Med-QUEST to modernize its technology, redesign service delivery, and stand-up new capabilities.

As the senior product expert in Med-QUEST's Customer Experience Office, the Senior Product Manager determines what gets built, in what order, and how success is measured across the division's customer experience and digital service delivery programs. This position serves as the definitive expert in product management for Med-QUEST's customer experience transformation goals and advises senior leaders on how product strategy and delivery shape better outcomes. Reporting to the CX Transformation Officer and working alongside design and engineering colleagues, the Senior Product Manager owns the product vision and roadmap, aligning delivery priorities with federal mandates, program goals, user needs, and the division's capacity, and continuously reprioritizing as conditions change.

Day to day, the Senior Product Manager translates user needs, operational challenges, policy requirements, and federal mandates into prioritized backlogs and implementation-ready user stories for design, engineering, and vendor teams to execute against. They lead features from concept through launch, working closely with engineers, designers, policy, and program experts, defining and tracking outcomes including enrollment and renewal success, drop-off points, processing times, and error rates, to understand if the work is delivering results and guide what comes next.

Priorities include:

• Defining and driving product strategy for H.R. 1 work requirement implementation

• Improving online renewal flows to reduce eligibility worker burden

• Sustaining Hawaii's nation-leading ex parte renewal rates

• Translating ongoing discovery into prioritized, implementation-ready delivery

The Senior Product Manager delivers work both directly and collaboratively with vendor teams and contractors, setting requirements, evaluating deliverables, and holding that work accountable for cost, quality, and outcomes, while building internal product practices through mentoring staff and partners.

This is senior digital service delivery work navigating complex technical, policy, and operational systems, meeting time-sensitive federal requirements, and ensuring services are usable, accessible, and effective for the people Med-QUEST serves.

This position's official title is "Customer Experience Transformation Fellow (Product Manager)." This announcement refers to the role as Senior Product Manager. The two refer to the same position.

Minimum Qualification Requirements

LEGAL AUTHORIZATION TO WORK REQUIREMENT: The State of Hawaii requires all persons seeking employment with the government of the State shall be citizens, nationals, or permanent resident aliens of the United States, or eligible under federal law for unrestricted employment in the United States.

RECOMMENDED QUALIFICATIONS:

EDUCATION**:**Graduation from an accredited four (4) year college or university with a bachelor's degree or four years of equivalent experience.

EXPERIENCE: Minimum five (5) years of professional experience in product management, with at least two (2) years leading product strategy and delivery in complex, regulated, or government environments where the work required navigating multiple stakeholders and substantial constraints, similar in scope to policy and federal requirements. Experience translating user needs and business requirements into product roadmaps, prioritized backlogs, and delivery strategies. Proven track record delivering products or features iteratively and measuring outcomes using qualitative and quantitative data.

DESIRED EXPERIENCE:

• Government, healthcare, or nonprofit environments working on similar programs

• Federal/state policy, compliance, and procurement constraints

• Familiarity with government program delivery and balancing policy and technical realities

• Building human-centered design capacity within organizations

• Proven ability to develop and evaluate vendors based on outcome measurements

KNOWLEDGE:

• Product planning, development, monitoring, and evaluation within complex, regulated environments

• Product management principles including product vision, road-mapping, backlog management, and outcome measurement

• Human-centered design and user research methods

• Government service delivery contexts or large-scale public-facing systems

• Background in agile service delivery, discovery-to-delivery cycles, modernizing legacy systems, or API integrations and cloud architecture

• Government procurement processes, vendor management, and contract structures

• Federal and state regulatory environments governing benefits administration and eligibility systems

DESIRED KNOWLEDGE: Knowledge of Medicaid, SNAP, TANF, or other government benefits programs. Federal/state procurement regulations and advance planning document processes.

SKILLS/ABILITIES:

• Deliver outcomes in environments with complex processes, multiple stakeholders, or regulatory constraints

• Demonstrated ability to define product vision, establish clear criteria for success, and focus on outcomes while creating roadmaps, backlogs, or strategies

• Strong ability to translate user needs, business requirements, and policy constraints into prioritized, implementation-ready plans

• Proven track record using qualitative and quantitative data to address the needs of the user while advancing organizational goals

• Demonstrated ability to work in cross-functional teams and bridge gaps between organizational silos and technology

• Strong communication skills, including comfort engaging with executives, frontline staff, and technical teams

• Skilled in workflow mapping, prioritization, and outcome measurement

• Ability to facilitate decision-making across competing priorities

• Considerable resourcefulness and creativity in developing new program approaches

• Adaptability and thrives in ambiguous environments and can quickly adjust approach based on new information

Other Information

This position is exempt from the civil service and considered temporary in nature. Therefore, if you are appointed to the position, your employment is considered "at will" which means you may be discharged from your employment at the prerogative of your department head or designee at any time.

The appointment will have a specified not-to-exceed (NTE) date and is subject to the availability of funding and the operational needs of the department. Appointment duration, including any extension, is determined by the department and applicable State requirements.

Work Location

The primary work location for this position is identified in the job announcement. Any telework or alternative work arrangement is subject to departmental policy and approval and is not guaranteed as a condition of employment.

Benefits

Eligibility for employee benefits depends on the type and duration of the appointment, work schedule, applicable benefit plans, and federal and State requirements. Employees appointed to exempt positions may be eligible for the State's applicable employee benefits, subject to the requirements of the applicable plans and policies, or may be subject to different benefit provisions.

Important Note

The information above is intended to provide a general description of the position. Actual employment terms and benefit eligibility are governed by pertinent appointment documents, applicable State laws and rules, Department of Human Resources Development policies and procedures, benefit plan documents, and other applicable departmental requirements.

HOW TO APPLY:

Email the following documents to: bleong2@dhs.hawaii.gov

• Cover letter;

• PDF copy of your completed State of Hawaii Application for Non-Civil Service Appointment HRD 278 (click here http://humanservices.hawaii.gov/application-for-non-civil-service-appointment/ for the application); and

• A detailed resume, current resume may be included with (but not in lieu of) the completed HRD 278

The State Recruiting Office will refer you to the Department of Human Services, Human Resources Office, Recruitment and Examination Staff at bleong2@dhs.hawaii.gov regarding this exempt position.