Staff Technical Program Manager - Platform Org

Join the team redefining how the world experiences design.

Hey, hello, hiya, g'day, mabuhay, kia ora, 你好, hallo, vítejte!

Thanks for stopping by. We know job hunting can be a little time consuming and you're probably keen to find out what's on offer, so we'll get straight to the point.

Where and how you can work

Our flagship campus is in Sydney. We also have a campus in Melbourne and co-working spaces in Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide. But you have choice in where and how you work. That means if you want to do your thing in the office (if you're near one), at home or a bit of both, it's up to you.

About Platforms Org & Enterprise Readiness

About Platforms Org in Canva
At Canva, the Platforms Org is made up of two major SuperGroups; these are the Infrastructure SuperGroup and the Product Platform SuperGroup. Infra’s focus is to make infrastructure easy for all the other engineering teams at Canva. We accomplish this by optimising existing solutions, developing internal tooling, promoting best practices throughout the organisation, introducing global infrastructure changes, and mentoring the engineering teams on how to do infrastructure - the right way. 

Product Platform at Canva is responsible for developing and maintaining the foundational systems and services that support the entire Canva product. This includes ensuring the scalability, reliability, and performance of the platform to handle the growing user base and feature set. The supergroup works on various backend systems, application platforms, and user platforms to provide a seamless and efficient experience for both users and developers.

About Enterprise Readiness

One of the main major programs currently underway to enable Enterprise readiness in Canva is Data Residency. It aims to provide the capability of processing and hosting customer data in their preferred region. This enables them to meet their compliance requirements while giving admins full control and visibility over where their data resides. It also unlocks Enterprise and Education district roll outs in the EU. The Program runs across 40 teams in Canva including Platform teams & Product teams, 10 Supergroups, and three continents. It requires strong TPM skills to pull it all together and make this crazy big goal happen!

This role will also have an impact in the wider Enterprise landscape at Canva including working on other exciting programs like BYOK and FedRamp.

What you’d be doing in this role

As Canva scales change continues to be part of our DNA. But we like to think that's all part of the fun. So this will give you the flavour of the type of things you'll be working on when you start, but this will likely evolve.

At the moment, this role is focused on:

• Lead the Program planning based on Company-wide processes: partnering with Engineering leads and Product Managers to support Strategic Planning and guiding Delivery Planning including scoping, prioritising, estimating and managing capacity.
• Fully understand the technical solution, be able to facilitate technical discussions with Engineering teams and help identify and close gaps.
• Manage technical dependencies across both Platform & Product Teams: proactively monitoring requirements for cross-functional work and facilitating dependency discussions.
• Drive delivery and unblock teams to deliver outcomes in a timely manner: managing risks and issues, escalating them as needed, and driving timely decision-making.
• Track and report on the progress of the program: defining required processes for tracking delivery status and running regular cadences to manage delivery.
• Build a strong and trusted relationship with your leadership and Engineering teams: this is crucial for effective leadership, influencing strategic decisions and identifying areas for improvement in delivery.
• Hold everyone accountable to their roles and responsibilities ensuring success as a team: this emphasises the TPM's role in ensuring clarity and adherence to responsibilities.
• Promote excellence, increase velocity and improve cross-collaboration: being an expert on delivery tools, exploring new methodologies, building dashboards and roadmaps, and upholding delivery standards.
• Facilitate continual improvement rituals to build the effectiveness of product development and engineering teams
• Lead efforts to uplift the TPM subspecialty practices across Canva improving our delivery capability in Engineering and creating a sustainable culture of urgency in delivery.

You're probably a match if

• You have prior experience in engineering or security, with a transition into a Technical Program Management (TPM) role, or equivalent expertise in related fields
• You have a minimum of 7 years of TPM experience in tech, preferably at high growth SaaS companies
• You have proven experience in driving and leading complex Security, Platform, or Cloud Infrastructure programs.
• You have experience collaborating with Product Managers and Engineers across Platform and Product teams, facilitating planning, and ensuring effective roadmaps and rollout plans.
• You have mastered technical dependency management and are skilled at unblocking teams.
• You have experience identifying, monitoring, and resolving risks, issues, and technical dependencies across teams to drive timely decisions and overcome delivery blockers.
• You have a strong understanding of Agile software development processes, methodologies, and best practices.
• You have strong technical knowledge of Cloud platforms (AWS, GCP, Azure), networking, and SaaS architecture.
• You have exceptional communication, leadership, and stakeholder management skills, with the ability to build strong relationships, operate independently, influence at all levels, and hold teams accountable.
• You are comfortable with ambiguity in a fast-paced environment and the ability to navigate complexity and tackle ambiguous problems.
• You have demonstrated ability to lead process improvements and enhance cross-functional collaboration to improve delivery effectiveness.

Nice to haves

• Experience with international product launches or infrastructure scaling
• Understanding of cloud-native security tooling like KMS, HashiCorp Vault
• Experience working with US public sector or FedRAMP-authorized service
• Familiarity with regulatory requirements like GDPR, FedRAMP, and data residency frameworks

What's in it for you?

Achieving our crazy big goals motivates us to work hard - and we do - but you'll experience lots of moments of magic, connectivity and fun woven throughout life at Canva, too. We also offer a range of benefits to set you up for every success in and outside of work.

Here's a taste of what's on offer:

• Equity packages - we want our success to be yours too
• Inclusive parental leave policy that supports all parents & carers
• An annual Vibe & Thrive allowance to support your wellbeing, social connection, office setup & more
• Flexible leave options that empower you to be a force for good, take time to recharge and supports you personally

Check out lifeatcanva.com for more info.

Other stuff to know

We make hiring decisions based on your experience, skills and passion, as well as how you can enhance Canva and our culture. When you apply, please tell us the pronouns you use and any reasonable adjustments you may need during the interview process.

We celebrate all types of skills and backgrounds at Canva so even if you don’t feel like your skills quite match what’s listed above - we still want to hear from you!

Please note that interviews are conducted virtually.