Product Relations Manager

About the role

Description from the employer’s posting. Check the employer’s page for the current version.

Our mission We're making Africa the first cashless continent. In 2017, over half the population in Sub-Saharan Africa had no bank account. That's for good reason—the fees are too high, the closest branch can be miles away, and nobody takes cards. Without access to financial institutions, people are forced to keep their savings under the mattress. Small business owners rely on lenders who charge extortionate rates. Parents spend hours waiting in line to pay school fees in cash. We're solving this by building financial services that just work: no account fees, instantly available, and accepted everywhere. In places where electricity, water and roads don't always work, you can still send money with Wave. In 2017, we launched a mobile app in Senegal for cash deposit, withdrawal, and peer-to-peer and business payments. Now, we have millions of users across 9 countries and are growing fast. Our goal is to make Africa the first cashless continent and that's where you come in... How you'll help us achieve it Wave is now the largest financial institution in Senegal and Côte d'Ivoire, with millions of users, growing rapidly year-on-year. And, we’re still in the early days of our product roadmap and potential impact on people’s everyday lives. The Product Relations Manager (PRM) owns the product and technical dimension of our external partner integrations. You are the bridge between our partners and our product and engineering teams, responsible for evaluating, shaping, shipping, and maintaining the integrations that power our ecosystem. In this role, you'll; Relentlessly build partner relationships and drive integrations end-to-end, from scoping through development, testing, and production launch to owning every blocker until it ships. Evaluate prospective partners' technical readiness and provide clear go/no-go recommendations before contracts are signed. Lead technical scoping with partners and translate requirements into specifications engineering can build against. Hold partners accountable for delivery and escalate firmly when things stall. Monitor integration health post-launch and drive resolution when performance degrades. Identify opportunities to expand or deepen existing partnerships. Make build-vs-buy and direct-vs-aggregator decisions grounded in data and strategic context. Lead cross-functional execution across Engineering, Legal, Compliance, Finance, Marketing, Support, and Partner Operations to deliver and maintain integrations. Use transaction data and operational metrics to inform prioritization and decision-making. Contribute to standardizing integration processes and playbooks across markets. Key details You'll be based in our office in Senegal, with travel to partner offices and field locations across our markets This is a permanent position with mission-based deployments. Our salaries are competitive and calculated using a transparent formula. We offer generous health insurance for yourself and your dependents. We support working parents - we offer 26 weeks of parental leave for mothers and 4 weeks for fathers, in addition to subsidized child care when they return to work. Airtime reimbursement. Free food and a beautiful office space. Requirements 4–7 years in product management, technical partnerships, or integration management within fintech, mobile money, digital payments, or telecommunications. Technical fluency: comfortable reviewing API docs (REST, SOAP, webhooks), discussing VPN setups, evaluating timeout configurations, and holding your own with engineers and partner technical teams. Commercial awareness: you understand how integrations drive transaction volume, revenue, and user value and can evaluate whether one is worth building. Experience managing complex, multi-stakeholder integrations involving banks, telcos, utility companies, or government agencies. Strong relationship management and negotiation skills, you can push back on partners, escalate when needed, and keep the relationship intact. Excellent communication in both French and English (written and spoken). Data-driven decision-making: you use metrics to inform priorities, not just instinct. Bachelor's degree in IT, Computer Science, Engineering, Business, Economics, or a related field. You might be a good fit if you Find stalled integrations frustrating but your instinct is to diagnose the bottleneck and push through, not wait. Can switch between reviewing API documentation in the morning and running a partner marketing alignment call in the afternoon. Think about integrations in terms of user impact and transaction volume, not just technical completion. Are comfortable pushing back on partner executives when their requests don't align with sound product architecture. Navigate both French-speaking and English-speaking partner environments with confidence. Care about financial inclusion and building products for underserved populations. Our team We have a rapidly growing in-country team in Senegal, Côte d'Ivoire, Mali, Burkina Faso, The Gambia, Uganda, Niger, Sierra Leone, and Cameroon plus remote team members spread across the world. We're deeply passionate about our mission of bringing radically affordable financial services to the people who need them most. We foster autonomy for our employees. You'll own your projects at every stage, from understanding the problem to monitoring your solution in production. We raised the largest Series A in Africa in 2021. Our world-class investors, include Founders Fund, Sequoia Heritage, Stripe, Ribbit Capital, Y Combinator, and Partech Africa. We are on Y Combinator's top companies by revenue . How to apply Fill out the form below, and upload a resume in English and a cover letter describing your interest in Wave and the role. We review applications frequently and recommend that you apply to the role that most closely aligns with your skills, experience and career goals. Wave is an equal-opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all employees.