At Cengage, our employees have a direct impact in helping learners around the world discover the power and joy of learning. We are bonded by our shared purpose – driving innovation that helps millions of learners improve their lives and achieve their dreams through education.
The Portfolio Manager (PM) is a Cengage School Portfolio Management Role at Cengage.
As the Portfolio Manager for Cengage School, you’ll lead a portfolio of market-leading educational products within Gale K12 School and Public Library markets. The PM develops product strategy by understanding the audience, analyzing the market and competitive trends, developing hypotheses, testing ideas in the market, processing data, and ultimately making strategic product decisions based on these insights and evidence. The PM leads product development, collaborating with team members to ensure on-time delivery of high-quality learning experiences. The PM clearly articulates the features and benefits of a product to the market, enabling the creation and delivery of compelling messaging for target audiences through measurable campaigns and programs. This role will support the Gale K12 (Science) portfolio in the School market, with some crossover into the Public Library space.
What you'll do here:
- Lead a profitable product line by being responsible for the content strategy roadmap for the Gale K12 (Science) suite of products, inclusive of In Context, eBooks, and supplemental curriculum.
- Provide product leadership, representing the portfolio and customers across audiences.
- Use data to make market-informed business proposals, take mitigated risks, and guide strategic decisions.
- Defines long-term goals based on research and trends, and sets metrics-driven milestones, making connections across datasets and courses to devise solutions to sophisticated business challenges
- Balance experience, market knowledge, and insights to make impactful decisions and long-term plans.
- Translate priorities into organized end-to-end strategic development plans with budgets, resources, performance goals, and key checkpoints.
- Provide project team direction, facilitating effective communication, and ensuring timely delivery of multiple products simultaneously within scope and budget.
- Cultivate an environment of creativity and collaboration.
- Deliver quality learning experiences to students, instructors, and librarians.
- Develop a deep understanding of competitors and an ability to anticipate competitor activity.
- Identify and test product ideas within segments, including the administration of focus groups, advisory boards, reviews, and customer meetings as appropriate.
- Regularly analyze product and portfolio plans to align forecasting and measurement of progress towards goals.
- Work across teams with colleagues in Digital, Marketing, Sales, Content Engineering, and other cross-functional teams to set and implement the content strategy, and to ensure successful release of products in the marketplace.
- Partner with colleagues in other functional areas on discipline-specific and pan-Cengage initiatives.
- Make presentations at internal and external meetings and academic conventions in support of sales efforts and to drive sales.
- Shares best practices across teams and functional groups.
Skills you will need here:
- Creative and curious problem solving and collaboration
- Understanding of the K12 educational technology and publishing industry, with a specific focus on Science
- Ability to clearly articulate vision and strategy and help team members understand how their work impacts business success
- Customer focus; understanding of how customer needs and challenges translate into opportunities
- Demonstration of strong communication skills with keen ability to facilitate team meetings, presentations, focus groups, and interviews.
- BA or BS Degree
- Minimum 5 years in product management, product development, or other relevant portfolio management role
- Cross-functional team leadership experience
- Ability to inspire change through influence; honed social skills
- Self-discipline with a high degree of accountability
- Strong financial analysis and modeling skills and an understanding of business metrics
- Natural curiosity and willingness to learn paired with a desire for continuous improvement
- Proven written and verbal abilities enabling the preparation and presentation of information and recommendations to a diverse and senior level audience
- Expected travel ~10% of time
- Proficiency with Word, Excel, and PowerPoint
Cengage is committed to working with broad talent pools to attract and hire strong and most qualified individuals. Our job applicants are considered regardless of any classification protected by applicable federal, state, provincial or local laws.
Cengage is also committed to providing reasonable accommodations for qualified individuals with disabilities including during our job application process. If you are an applicant with a disability and require reasonable accommodation in our job application process, please contact us at [email protected].
About Cengage
Cengage, a global education technology company serving millions of learners, provides affordable, quality digital products and services that equip students with the skills and competencies needed to be job ready. For more than 100 years, we have enabled the power and joy of learning with trusted, engaging content, and now, integrated digital platforms. We serve the higher education, workforce skills, secondary education, English language teaching and research markets worldwide. Through our scalable technology, including MindTap and Cengage Unlimited, we support all learners who seek to improve their lives and achieve their dreams through education.
Compensation
At Cengage Group, we take great pride in our commitment to providing a comprehensive and rewarding Total Rewards package designed to support and empower our employees. Click here to learn more about our Total Rewards Philosophy.
The full base pay range has been provided for this position. Individual base pay will vary based on work schedule, qualifications, experience, internal equity, and geographic location. Sales roles often incorporate a significant incentive compensation program beyond this base pay range.
In this position, you will be eligible to participate in the company’s discretionary incentive bonus program. This position's bonus target amount, which is not guaranteed and is dependent on individual performance and overall company results among other factors, is provided below.
5% Annual: Individual Target$77,100.00 - $100,200.00 USD
Skills Required
- BA or BS degree
- Minimum 5 years of experience in product management, product development, or relevant portfolio management
- Understanding of the K12 educational technology and publishing industry, specifically Science
- Cross-functional team leadership experience
- Strong financial analysis and modeling skills and understanding of business metrics
- Strong written and verbal communication and presentation skills
- Ability to facilitate team meetings, presentations, focus groups, and interviews
- Proficiency with Word, Excel, and PowerPoint
- Ability to articulate product vision and strategy and influence cross-functional teams
- Expected travel of approximately 10%
Cengage Group Compensation & Benefits Highlights
The following summarizes recurring compensation and benefits themes identified from responses generated by popular LLMs to common candidate questions about Cengage Group and has not been reviewed or approved by Cengage Group.
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Leave & Time Off Breadth — Paid parental leave and company-designated wellness time off (including a year-end week off) stand out as notable time-away benefits. Flexible work positioning (virtual-first/remote-first) further increases the practical value of time-off and work-life support.
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Wellbeing & Lifestyle Benefits — Workplace mental-health support appears to be a meaningful part of the rewards package, reinforced by external recognition for mental-health practices. Wellness-oriented programs and designated wellness days contribute additional lifestyle value beyond cash pay.
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Inclusive Benefits Coverage — Benefits and policies signal strong inclusion positioning, supported by external equality recognition. Family-related supports (e.g., fertility resources and parent support) also broaden who can benefit from the package.
Cengage Group Insights
What We Do
With more than 100 years of serving learners, Cengage Group is a global edtech company that enables student choice. No matter how, where, when or why someone wants to learn, our portfolio of education businesses supports all students, from middle school through graduate school and skills education, with quality content and technology. Collectively, our three business units – Cengage Academic, Cengage Work, and Cengage Select – help millions of students each year in more than 125 countries achieve their education and career goals and lead choice-filled lives. Visit us at www.cengagegroup.com
Why Work With Us
Our employee experience centers around a shared purpose: to help millions of learners achieve their dreams and improve their lives through education. Whether you want to make a difference in the world or start a fulfilling career in edtech, we focus on providing our employees with meaningful work while empowering them with resources to succeed.
