Job description

ABOUT US Our mission is to reinvent the way people learn, starting with language. Learning a language can change a life by opening doors to new cultures, careers, and communities. Two billion people around the world are actively trying to learn a language, but the best way to learn (one-on-one tutoring) is hard to access at scale and hasn’t been meaningfully improved in decades. Speak is building a human-level, AI-powered tutor in your pocket: a conversation-first experience that lets learners actually speak, get instant feedback, and progress through carefully designed lessons. The result is a complete path from beginner to confident speaker across multiple languages. Speak first launched in South Korea in 2019, where Speak has now become the number one language learning app, and we now serve learners across many markets and 15+ languages. Speak is one of the world’s leading AI companies, with over $150m raised in venture investment from OpenAI, Accel, Founders Fund, Khosla Ventures, and more, with a distributed team across San Francisco, Seoul, Tokyo, Taipei, and Ljubljana. ABOUT THIS ROLE We're hiring a Product Manager to answer a question every learner and customer should be able to answer: is the learner actually getting better? Speak sees many signals of progress — assessments, practice, mistakes, learning activity, and what a learner can do over time. Today, those signals do not yet form one clear picture. This PM will turn them into a product that helps learners understand where they are, whether they are improving, and what to do next. For companies using Speak, the same work should provide credible evidence that their learners are making progress. This is a hands-on senior IC role. You'll work across Product, Engineering, Analytics, Learning, Design, and our B2B team, but the job is not to coordinate those groups. The job is to learn the problem deeply, make the product choices, and ship. WHAT YOU'LL BE DOING - Own product strategy and roadmap for learning outcomes and proficiency. - Talk directly with learners and B2B customers to understand how they judge progress today and where the current experience fails them. - Decide which signals of proficiency and progress are trustworthy enough to drive product decisions. - Ship improvements in assessment, progress, and feedback that help learners understand where they are and what to do next. - Connect measurement back to the learning experience so what we know about a learner changes what Speak does for them. - Define practical quality bars for accuracy, trust, transparency, and actionability. - Work with Engineering, Analytics, Learning, and Design to turn ambiguous evidence into a focused product decision and a measured release. WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR If you don't think you meet every criterion below but are excited about the role, please apply. We care more about evidence of strong product judgment and learning speed than a perfect match on background. Must-have Qualifications - Strong product judgment in ambiguous, 0→1 problems: you can choose what matters, narrow scope, and explain what you would learn next. - Experience combining user research and product data to make consequential product decisions. - Systems thinking: you can understand how user experience, data, models, workflows, and technical constraints fit together without losing sight of the user problem. - A track record of shipping products with measurable user or business outcomes. - Clear written and verbal communication. Nice-to-have Qualifications - Experience with B2B products where the buyer, admin, and end user have different needs. - Experience with measurement-heavy products, personalization, health, education, or other outcomes-oriented systems. - Interest in language learning or learning science. Prior experience with proficiency, psychometrics, assessments, or education is not required. WHY WORK AT SPEAK 1. Join a fantastic, tight-knit team at the right time: we're growing very quickly, we've most recently raised our Series C from some of the top investors in the valley, and we've achieved product-market fit in our initial markets. You'd join at a magical time when a single person could significantly change the course of the company. 2. Do your life's work with people you’ll love working with: we care strongly about our craft and want every person at Speak to feel like they're growing every day. We believe in the idea that working with people you both enjoy and have respect for makes everything better. We hire thoughtfully and only work with people we admire deeply. 3. Global in nature: We're live in over 40 countries and launching in a number of new markets soon. We have dedicated offices in San Francisco, Ljubljana, Seoul, Tokyo, and Taipei, and you’ll have the opportunity to talk to users in each of these regions on a regular basis as well as travel. 4. Impact people's lives in a major way: Learning a language is one of the single most life-changing skills one can learn, and right now 99% of people never achieve their goal because the process is broken. We’re helping millions of people achieve their goals and improve their lives. Speak does not discriminate based upon race, religion, color, national origin, gender (including pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions), sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, age, status as a protected veteran, status as an individual with a disability, or other applicable legally protected characteristics.

Requirements

Must-haves

We're hiring a Product Manager to answer a question every learner and customer should be able to answer: is the learner actually getting better?
Own product strategy and roadmap for learning outcomes and proficiency.
Talk directly with learners and B2B customers to understand how they judge progress today and where the current experience fails them.
Decide which signals of proficiency and progress are trustworthy enough to drive product decisions.
Ship improvements in assessment, progress, and feedback that help learners understand where they are and what to do next.
Connect measurement back to the learning experience so what we know about a learner changes what Speak does for them.
Define practical quality bars for accuracy, trust, transparency, and actionability.
Work with Engineering, Analytics, Learning, and Design to turn ambiguous evidence into a focused product decision and a measured release.
If you don't think you meet every criterion below but are excited about the role, please apply. We care more about evidence of strong product judgment and learning speed than a perfect match on background.
Must-have Qualifications
Strong product judgment in ambiguous, 0→1 problems: you can choose what matters, narrow scope, and explain what you would learn next.
Experience combining user research and product data to make consequential product decisions.
Systems thinking: you can understand how user experience, data, models, workflows, and technical constraints fit together without losing sight of the user problem.
A track record of shipping products with measurable user or business outcomes.
Clear written and verbal communication.
Experience with B2B products where the buyer, admin, and end user have different needs.
Experience with measurement-heavy products, personalization, health, education, or other outcomes-oriented systems.
Interest in language learning or learning science.
Prior experience with proficiency, psychometrics, assessments, or education is not required.

Nice-to-haves

Nice-to-have Qualifications

Application prep

Use the role’s language and application details while tailoring your materials.

Keywords to mirror

Platform: ashby
Effort: quick