Director, Beta Programs & Customer Validations

Welcome to the intersection of energy and home services. At NRG, we're driven by our passion to create a smarter, cleaner and more connected future.

Vivint Smart Home, an NRG owned company, is a leading smart home company in the United States, dedicated to redefining the home experience with intelligent products and services. We find purpose in proactively protecting and keeping our customers connected to home, no matter where they are. Join the Smart Home team to create smarter, safer and more sustainable homes.

Position Overview

The Director of Beta Programs & Customer Validations will lead the strategic infrastructure, framework design, and satisfaction validation of Vivint's core portfolio and emerging offers. Reporting directly to the Sr. Director of Product Lifecycle, this role is a key leadership position within the Product Lifecycle team, bridging the gap between high-level executive vision and flawless tactical execution. You will manage a dedicated team of product professionals to ensure that every hardware and software product undergoes rigorous, data-driven validation before scaling to millions of users.

In this role, you will own the critical "sandbox" phase where new features and hardware are tested with early cohorts. Your primary mandate is to build a quantifiable case for value-specifically ensuring products meet strict Product Satisfaction (PSAT) scores during beta-and ensuring those standards hold firmly when graduating the product to the full population. Acting as a core operational bridge, you will ensure the business is operationally ready for launch and that any post-launch performance regressions are aggressively root-caused and addressed.

Key Responsibilities

• Sandbox Phase & Cohort Testing: Own the end-to-end "sandbox" phase of the lifecycle. Directly own and build the comprehensive beta testing roadmap, driving the strategic sequencing and execution of testing new features and hardware with early user cohorts to build a quantifiable case for product value.
• Beta Methodologies & Program Management: Manage the specialized tools, testing pools, and operational mechanisms required to run best-in-class beta testing and customer validation programs. Define, implement, and scale standardized testing methodologies across all product lines to ensure consistency and rigor.
• Data Standardization, reporting, & Readiness: Standardize how quantitative and qualitative data is used across the organization to objectively measure product readiness. Own the regular synthesis and reporting out of beta results, insights, and key performance metrics to leadership, establishing clear execution milestones before general market launch.
• Feedback Infrastructure & Loops: Design and scale the operational infrastructure for customer feedback loops, partnering deeply with teams including UX Research and Customer Service to capture, synthesize, and incorporate qualitative user insights as a critical data stream during validations.
• PSAT Ownership & Validation: Guard product quality by ensuring all products achieve target PSAT scores during the validation phase, and actively monitor these metrics post-launch to ensure standards hold when graduating products to the full population.
• Cross-Functional Launch Readiness: Coordinate cross-functionally across Sales, Supply Chain, Product, and Engineering to ensure the broader business is operationally ready for launch. If a product fails to maintain its validation PSAT score during general launch, lead cross-org mechanisms to root cause and resolve the variance.
• Team Leadership & Coaching: Direct, mentor, and develop a core team of product operations and validation professionals, fostering a culture of technical excellence, data-driven decision-making, and deep customer-centricity.

Requirements & Qualifications

• Experience: 7-10 years of experience in product operations, product management, beta program management, launch & experimentation, or product strategy roles (ideally within high-growth tech, smart home, or energy ecosystems).
• Leadership: 2-4 years of direct people management experience, with a proven track record of guiding a team to deliver complex, multi-phase validation and launch frameworks.
• Framework Mastery: Strong experience establishing cross-organizational mechanisms, managing continuous deployment/experimentation sandboxes, and using structured prioritization frameworks. Proven capability in designing end-to-end beta testing roadmaps and establishing rigorous validation methodologies.
• Analytical & Qualitative Skills: Demonstrated ability to work with complex data sets and qualitative research, refining them into core metrics (like PSAT or CSAT) and clear execution milestones for leadership review.
• Education: B.S. or M.S. in a Business or Technical Field; MBA preferred.
• Cross-Functional Collaboration: Proven track record of working across broad sets of stakeholders, including UX research, product, design, engineering, QA, operations, and data teams to drive velocity and unblock dependencies.

Working Conditions

This job operates in a professional office environment. This role routinely uses standard office equipment such as computers, phones, photocopiers, filing cabinets, and fax machines.

We support the use of AI tools to help you prepare for your interview (e.g., practicing responses, researching the role, or refining your resume). However, during interviews and assessments, we expect responses to reflect your own thinking, experience, and communication. Use of AI to generate or read answers in real time, complete assessments, or misrepresent your qualifications is not permitted and may impact your candidacy.

Job Functions

Position requires in-office presence in Seattle, WA on a hybrid schedule for Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday with a work from home day on Friday. The position will start remote and then will move into the hybrid schedule.

The base salary range for this position is: $177,520 - $292,920* *The base salary range above represents the low and high end of the salary range for this position. Actual salaries will vary based on several factors including but not limited to location, experience, and performance. The range listed is just one component of the total compensation package for employees. Other rewards may include annual bonus, short- and long-term incentives, and program-specific awards. In addition the position may be eligible to participate in the benefits program which include, but are not limited to, medical, vision, dental, 401K, and flexible spending accounts.

NRG Energy is committed to a drug and alcohol-free workplace. To the extent permitted by law and any applicable collective bargaining agreement, employees are subject to periodic random drug testing, and post-accident and reasonable suspicion drug and alcohol testing. EOE AA M/F/Vet/Disability. Level, Title and/or Salary may be adjusted based on the applicant's experience or skills.

Official description on file with Talent.