Technical Certification Program Manager

Technical Certification Program Manager

Location: Remote within the U.S. or hybrid/in-office at select U.S. locations
Contract: 12-month W2 contract
Pay: $170-$185/hour depending on experience

Employment Partner: Russell Tobin

Russell Tobin is partnering with a leading AI research and technology company to hire a Technical Certification Program Manager to support a rapidly growing global technology certification and assessment program.

This is a highly operational role for someone who has hands-on experience running or serving as a core operator of a technology certification program with a proctored exam vendor.

The certification program is already live globally and continues to expand across a large partner ecosystem, with additional certifications, skills badges, and performance-based assessments in development. This individual will serve as the program leader's operating partner, owning the day-to-day operational infrastructure needed to scale the program successfully.

What You'll Do

• Serve as the program leader's operating partner, owning delegated workstreams from planning through execution and keeping initiatives moving between key decisions.
• Manage relationships with certification vendors across exam delivery, proctoring, digital badging, and certification preparation content.
• Lead vendor operating cadences, escalations, change requests, service-level tracking, voucher management, and invoice reconciliation.
• Own exam security and integrity operations, including proctoring configuration, security flags, data-forensics reviews, content exposure monitoring, and candidate integrity cases.
• Manage certification-related questions and escalations from partners, customers, account teams, and internal stakeholders.
• Develop clear partner- and candidate-facing communications related to program updates, policies, and operational changes.
• Drive adoption of certifications across a global partner ecosystem by analyzing participation, identifying gaps by partner or region, and coordinating campaigns, incentives, and enablement initiatives.
• Translate certification policies—including retakes, recertification, appeals, and misconduct—into scalable operating processes and candidate-facing documentation.
• Manage credential lifecycle activities including renewals, credential verification, and revocations.
• Partner with the learner support team on escalated certification cases and use support trends to improve processes, escalation paths, and response templates.
• Own and prioritize the program's systems and tooling backlog, gathering needs from vendors, support teams, partners, and program data and partnering with engineering and other teams on improvements.
• Own certification program analytics and reporting, including pass rates, item performance, retake patterns, security trends, adoption metrics, dashboards, and recurring leadership reviews.
• Identify opportunities to use AI tools to automate workflows, accelerate analysis and reporting, improve communications, and reduce manual operational effort.
• Build and document repeatable operating processes that allow the program to scale globally.

Required Qualifications

• Experience running or serving as a core operator of a technology certification program.
• Hands-on experience managing exam delivery through a proctored exam vendor.
• Working knowledge of the credential and assessment development lifecycle, including job task analysis, exam blueprints, item development and review, and standard setting.
• Direct experience with exam security, candidate integrity, and certification policies.
• Ability to analyze assessment and program data, including pass rates, item statistics, retake patterns, security trends, and other performance indicators.
• Experience managing vendors responsible for business-critical program functions, including scope, escalations, service levels, and operational performance.
• Experience working directly with partners, customers, or account teams to resolve program questions and escalations.
• Strong multi-workstream program management skills, including dependency management, risk tracking, prioritization, and executive status reporting.
• Experience developing, writing, or operationalizing certification policies such as retakes, recertification, appeals, misconduct, and credential lifecycle policies.
• Hands-on experience using AI tools in day-to-day work for automation, analysis, communication, or operational improvement.
• Demonstrated experience creating new operating processes and documenting them so they can be consistently executed by others.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills with the ability to work effectively with partners, vendors, technical teams, and senior leadership.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience building or scaling an early-stage certification or credentialing program in a fast-moving technology environment.
• Familiarity with digital badging platforms and credential lifecycle management.
• Experience supporting partner, channel, or ecosystem programs within a technology company.
• Understanding of how certifications can support partner tiers, incentives, enablement, or go-to-market programs.
• Experience with integrations between exam delivery vendors, digital badging platforms, and internal systems such as identity platforms, CRM systems, or data warehouses.
• Experience gathering requirements and conducting acceptance testing for certification or assessment technology.
• Familiarity with support tooling and ticket-based support workflows.
• Experience developing program reporting through BI tools or data warehouses or partnering closely with analytics teams to do so.
• Experience launching or operating hands-on or performance-based assessments.

Ideal Candidate

The strongest candidate will combine credentialing expertise with strong operational program management skills. You understand how certification programs work behind the scenes—from proctored exam delivery and vendor management to security investigations, policies, credential lifecycle management, analytics, and partner adoption.

You are comfortable taking broad program objectives and turning them into working processes, resolving operational issues without waiting for direction, and acting as a trusted operating partner to a senior program leader.

Important: General program management experience alone will not be sufficient for this role. Candidates should have direct experience operating a technology certification program and working with a proctored exam delivery vendor.