Program Management Leadership · 2026

Samir
Karandikar

Program Management Leader that brings clarity, drives alignment and delivers outcomes.

Program Management leader with 12+ years delivering $50M impact — AI systems, partner ecosystems, growth and transformations. I've scaled Program Management at startups from the ground up and in large matrixed organizations.

Get in touch See the impact →

About

The work
is in the
system.

I lead transformative programs spanning AI, partner ecosystems and growth — working directly with C-level executives to align strategy with execution. My experience bridges hypergrowth startups and Fortune 500 enterprises.

At Atlassian, I built the AI connector portfolio that unlocked Rovo AI search and chat, reaching 100K monthly active users in 3 months. I rearchitected the operational model between Atlassian and its Marketplace partners — cutting cloud migration delays by 55% and lifting partner satisfaction from 68% to 80%.

Before that, I established The Washington Post's program management function during a period of significant organizational scaling — leading a team through 40% YoY growth while improving delivery predictability, customer satisfaction, and PM effectiveness.

I care about delivering measurable business outcomes by building relationships, creating clarity in complex environments, and establishing systems that scale.

Impact

Twelve years. $50M+ delivered. Each number below represents a team, a constraint, and a decision to do it properly.

100K

Monthly Active Users

AI Connectors · Atlassian Rovo

Owned delivery of 50 connectors that unlocked AI search and chat in Atlassian Rovo — reaching 100,000 monthly active users in just 3 months from launch.

120h

Saved per Week

Agentic AI · Atlassian Rovo

Built and deployed agentic AI solutions on the Atlassian Rovo platform that saved internal teams 120 hours per week — turning productivity from a talking point into a measurable outcome.

−55%

Migration Delays

Partner Ecosystem · Atlassian Marketplace

Rearchitected the operational model between Atlassian and its Marketplace partners. Cloud migration delays dropped 55%. Partner satisfaction rose from 68% to 80%. Designed and owned the global Partner Voice of Customer program.

$4M

Revenue Unlocked

Commerce & Monetization · Bitbucket Cloud

Owned the Commerce migration for Bitbucket Cloud and monetization of Bitbucket Packages and Runners — protecting $4M in revenue, migrating 80K+ paid workspaces, and unblocking 1M paid seats.

Experience

Atlassian

Sept 2021 — Apr 2026

Enterprise SaaS

Senior Program Manager

Owned the program portfolio for Atlassian Marketplace and Bitbucket Cloud across 20 teams. Delivered 50 AI connectors for Rovo reaching 100K MAU in 3 months. Built and deployed agentic AI solutions saving teams 120 hours/week. Led Commerce migration for Bitbucket Cloud and monetization of Packages & Runners unlocking $4M in revenue. Rearchitected the operational model with Marketplace partners — cutting migration delays 55% and raising partner satisfaction from 68% to 80%.

The Washington Post

May 2017 — Sept 2021

Media & Technology

Program Management Leader

Established and led the program management function during a period of significant organizational scaling. Managed a team of 4 Program Managers and Scrum Masters through 40% YoY growth — implementing frameworks that improved delivery predictability by 16%, customer satisfaction by 13%, and program manager effectiveness by 14%.

Perficient Inc

Jul 2016 — May 2017

Consulting

Program Manager

Led a cross-functional team of 30 designers, engineers and PMs to rebuild a billing system for a major ISP — delivering a complex technical program on time across a large, distributed team.

Cleon Inc

May 2013 — Jun 2019

Founder · IT Services

Founder & CEO

Founded and scaled an IT services firm from 0 to 15 billable consultants and $1.5M ARR — building the business development, delivery model, and team from the ground up.

Credentials

Project Management Professional

Project Management Institute

Agile Certified Practitioner

Project Management Institute

Atlassian Certified Expert

Atlassian

Professional Scrum Master III

Scrum.org · Fewer than 1,300 people worldwide hold this certification

Personal Projects

Name, Place, Animal, Thing

A browser-based multiplayer game where a random letter is picked each round and players race to enter a name, place, animal, and thing starting with that letter. Built end-to-end as a personal project — architecture, rules engine, real-time multiplayer, and deployment.

Open live →

AI System of Work

A RAG-based personal knowledge assistant that indexes Gmail, Google Drive, Calendar, and Slack data locally. Retrieves relevant context using semantic similarity, keyword matching, and recency weighting — then passes it to Claude to generate cited answers. Your full data stays on your machine; only retrieved context goes to the API. Also includes to-do list, calendar view, email composition, and Slack integration.

Contact

[email protected]

linkedin.com/in/samir-karandikar