Wayfarer Operations Program Lead, Niantic
$121.5-135k
+ Bonus + Equity
2 days a week in office (Sunnyvale, CA)
Augmented reality software development
Be an early applicant
Augmented reality software development
501-1000 employees
Be an early applicant
$121.5-135k
+ Bonus + Equity
2 days a week in office (Sunnyvale, CA)
501-1000 employees
Company mission
Niantic's mission is to shape a future where technology enables novel robotics, computing, and entertainment experiences, focusing predominantly on augmented reality games.
Role
Who you are
- We’re looking for someone with proven communication skills, as well as deep experience and enthusiasm for managing communities
- BA/BS degree and 5+ years experience in scaling and enhancing player experience or operational programs for a global digital product
- Excellent written and verbal communication in English. Fluency in additional languages (especially Japanese) is a plus
- Validated ability to lead complex projects and collaborate with multiple partners under pressure, thriving in fast-paced, hybrid environments while adapting to challenges
- A genuine passion for improving player experiences and a strong sense of ownership and initiative
- A strong belief in Niantic's mission and a passion for its products
- Ability to work in a fast-paced hybrid environment and handle stress appropriately and/or ability to solve practical problems and be sufficiently adaptable to handle dynamic situations with little advance notice
- Experience working on cross-functional teams with ability to communicate effectively through written and verbal communications, including asynchronous interactions with others
- Collaborate with the team in-person and in-office two days per week
What the job involves
- As a member of Player Experience, you’ll join a team that delights in delivering high-quality support, quick issue resolution, and useful and educational social and community experiences to the people who use Niantic games and products
- You’ll work closely with product and development partners to leverage data and customer insights to drive improvements and optimizations to the player experience, maintaining tight feedback loops between our players and cross-functional partners
- As the Wayfarer Operations Program Lead, you’ll manage a vibrant community of players who contribute to Niantic’s crowd-sourced map program, Wayfarer
- You’ll oversee and design engaging strategies to enrich the experience of our Wayfarer community, including stewardship of our community ambassador program as well as Wayfarer’s presence at Live Events
- Partner closely with product and engineering partners to ensure Wayfarer support and community programs are up-to-date, accurate, and prepared for new and updated feature launches
- Oversee Wayfarer operations, including workflow development, issue (bug) tracking and prioritization, and develop internal and external documentation for support agents and Wayfarer community members
- Oversee the Wayfarer support agents by answering policy questions, reviewing and implementing suggestions for process improvements, staffing on-call, and handling urgent or sensitive escalations
- Leverage data insights to champion the voice of the user in internal discussions with strategic partners of varying levels and job functions
- Work with regional partners to collect input on regional and cultural differences and improve implementation plans. Lead the implementation and continuous refinement of global PX standards, driving a consistent and exceptional player experience across all regions
- Build trust and motivate engagement in the Wayfarer Community through direct engagement in the community forum and at live events
- Manage a group of highly engaged and motivated players who act as community ambassadors by collecting their feedback, cultivating ongoing relationships, and ensuring sustained, high quality output
- Attend live events to provide onsite support of players, attendees and community members
- Proactively identify and resolve potential logistical and technical challenges for live events and in-game activities
- Collaborate with vendors and on-site teams to ensure smooth event delivery
- Continuously identify and advocate for improvements to support tools configurations and workflows for increased efficiency and effectiveness
- Constantly look for solutions to problems and evaluate ways to more efficiently and effectively lead the global support processes
- Serve as a subject matter expert in support tools, configuring ticketing systems and forums to align with organizational strategy and industry standards
- Collaborate with cross-functional team members and partners, including regular and reliable attendance and participation in meetings
- Facilitate resolutions and collaboration by providing clear and concise reporting on critical information and insights
- Continuously learn and evolve while collaborating with the global PX team to drive the programmatic improvements and champion the best practices
Our take
Niantic, Inc. is a software development company creating augmented reality mobile games, such as Ingress, Pokémon Go, and Harry Potter: Wizards Unite, that encourage players to go outside, explore, and meet people. The company was formed in 2010 as an internal startup within Google. Since its inception, hundreds of millions of people have used its products and services.
Although Niantic made a name for itself in the mobile gaming industry through the success of Pokémon Go, the company is hoping to become a platform for other developers to build location-aware AR apps on top of. In 2022, it released a location mapping software for AR, allowing AR experiences to be grounded to a physical location, like the front of a building or a park monument, rather than just floating aimlessly through a phone’s camera view.
Niantic plans to use this platform for an AR-based metaverse, an alternative to Meta’s plans for a VR-based metaverse that renders us bound to VR headsets. The company believes that an AR metaverse on a 3D map of the world will play a critical role in the next transition in computing, and raised funds to make this vision a reality in 2021.
Steph
Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle
Insights
-14% employee growth in 12 months
Company
Funding (last 2 of 8 rounds)
Nov 2021
$300m
SERIES D
Dec 2018
$245m
SERIES C
Total funding: $774.3m
Company benefits
- Robust medical, dental, and vision insurance including 100% paid employee healthcare
- 100% of premiums for long term and short term disability and life insurance
- Mental healthcare on-demand by Spring Health
- Increasing paid time off with tenure, separate sick time accrual, five flex days per year to attend Niantic community events or volunteer
- Company-wide shutdown between Christmas and New Years
- 16 weeks of parental leave for parents, parental leave transition assistance by Cleo, Carrot fertility benefit
- 401k Match, equity options, compare and refinance loans with Credible’s online loan marketplace
- Cold breakfast, hot lunch and snacks all day, every day
- Cell-phone, gym, and internet reimbursements, pre-tax commuter benefits, employee discounts via Fond
- Employee donation match of up to $500 per year
- Wellness activities including yoga and meditation, volunteer off-sites, employee Resource Groups
Company HQ
Embarcadero, San Francisco, CA
Leadership
John Hanke
(CEO)Having studied for an MBA at UCB, John worked as a Producer for 3DO before co-founding Big Network and Keyhole. He then spent over 11 years at Google as VP of Product, before leaving in October 2015 to found Niantic.
Phil Keslin
(CTO)Prior to Niantic, Phil was acontributor to StreetView, GMail and Lively products while at Google. Additionally Phil was a GPU Architect at NVIDIA and a key contributor to the design and development several of their GPUS.
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