San Francisco Project & Delivery: Stakeholder Management, JIRA, Project Management Lead 591 Roles -- January 2026

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San Francisco's Project and Delivery market in January 2026 tracked 591 roles across 340 employers, with a 14:1 senior-to-junior ratio making entry highly competitive. Mobility-sector employers led hiring among tracked companies, and the overall median salary sat at $154,500.

This report analyzes 591 Project & Delivery job postings from 340+ companies tracked via direct employer career pages and job board aggregators. Our coverage skews toward tech-forward and scaling companies; large enterprises using enterprise hiring platforms may be underrepresented. Coverage varies by section and is noted throughout.

Key Takeaways for Hiring Managers

1.0A 14:1 ratio gives you leverage at senior levels The highly competitive 14:1 senior-to-junior ratio means experienced delivery professionals are abundant relative to openings. This may allow hiring managers to be selective on domain expertise and cultural fit without extending timelines substantially.

1.1Compensation premiums may be needed for niche roles The overall median of $154,500 masks variation: programme managers command a $163,500 median versus $120,000 for project managers. Roles requiring specialized skills like AI fluency or mobility-sector experience may require above-median offers to attract top candidates.

1.2Growth-stage companies face stiffer competition Among tracked roles with maturity data (52% coverage), 56% came from mature companies and 69% from enterprise-scale organizations. Growth-stage firms (41% of roles) may need to differentiate on equity, mission, or flexibility to compete for experienced delivery hires.

1.3Management track roles represent 17% of openings With 83% of tracked roles on the IC track, managers are relatively scarce. Teams looking to hire delivery leads or heads of PMO should anticipate a smaller but potentially well-qualified candidate pool, and may benefit from considering internal promotions alongside external searches.

Compensation

13% of roles with disclosed salary ranges

Overall Distribution

25th Percentile

$120K

Median

$155K

75th Percentile

$185K

IQR (Spread)

$65K

Advertised Salary by Seniority

Advertised Salary by Role

Employers Hiring for Project & Delivery Roles

Low

High

Market interpretation: The top 15 employers account for 22% of tracked postings, indicating a broadly distributed hiring landscape with 1.74 jobs per employer on average. Waymo leads with 13 roles, followed by Uber (11) and a cluster of four employers tied at 10. Three employers are new to the top 15 this month: Atlassian, Instacart, and Accenture. Concentration at the top is a sampling artifact and should not be interpreted as overall market dominance.

Industry Distribution

53% of roles with industry data

Low

High

Among 53% of tracked roles with industry data, Professional Services leads at 19%, likely reflecting demand from consultancies running large transformation engagements. Mobility and Transportation (12%) is the second-largest sector, consistent with the autonomous vehicle cluster visible in the top employers. Consumer Tech gained 4 percentage points month-over-month while Mobility declined by 6 points, based on a single month's movement. Education Technology appeared as a new entry this period.

Role Specialization

Low

High

Programme manager (49%) and project manager (41%) together account for 90% of tracked delivery roles. Delivery manager holds 10% while scrum master is marginal at 1%. Based on a single month's movement, project manager gained 7 percentage points and programme manager declined by 6 points, which could be driven by seasonal variation in how employers title similar coordination roles rather than a structural shift.

Seniority Distribution

Junior: 0-2 years | Mid-Level: 3-5 years | Senior: 6-10 years | Staff/Principal: 11+ years (IC track) | Director+: Management track

Low

High

Senior-to-Junior Ratio

14:1

Senior+ roles per Junior role

Entry Accessibility Rate

22%

Junior + Mid-Level roles combined

Senior roles dominate at 54%, followed by Director+ and Mid-Level tied at 16% each, Staff/Principal at 7%, and Junior at 6%. The 14:1 senior-to-junior ratio makes this one of the most competitive entry-level delivery markets tracked. The 22% entry accessibility rate is the lowest across tracked cities, indicating that most delivery openings in San Francisco target experienced professionals.

Company Maturity

52% of roles with company age data

41%Growth Stage

Mature (>15 yrs)55%

Growth (6-15 yrs)41%

Young (<=5 yrs)4%

Among 52% of tracked roles with company age data, Mature companies (over 15 years old) account for 56% of postings, with Growth-stage firms at 41% and Young companies at just 4%. This distribution likely reflects the dominance of established tech and professional services firms in delivery hiring, where programme scale and organizational complexity tend to favor larger, more tenured employers.

Ownership Type

53% of roles with ownership data

45%Private

Private45%

Public44%

Subsidiary11%

Among 53% of tracked roles with ownership data, Private (45%) and Public (44%) companies are nearly evenly split, with Subsidiaries at 11%. The close balance may reflect the Bay Area's mix of publicly traded tech giants alongside large private companies and late-stage startups that have yet to IPO.

Employer Size Distribution

52% of roles with company size data

69%Enterprise

Enterprise (1,000+)70%

Scale-up (50-1,000)19%

Startup (<50)11%

Among 52% of tracked roles with company size data, Enterprise organizations (1,000+ employees) account for 69% of postings. Scale-ups contribute 19% and Startups 11%. This concentration likely reflects that delivery and programme management functions tend to scale with organizational size, as larger companies run more concurrent initiatives requiring dedicated coordination.

Working Arrangement

Onsite: office full-time | Hybrid: mix of office and remote | Remote: work from anywhere | Flexible: employee chooses arrangement

97% of roles with known working arrangement

40%Remote

Remote40%

Hybrid27%

Flexible26%

Onsite7%

Among 97% of tracked roles with working arrangement data (based on 126 ATS-sourced roles), Remote leads at 40%, followed by Hybrid (27%), Flexible (26%), and Onsite (7%). The high remote share may reflect delivery roles' inherent suitability for distributed work, as coordination and stakeholder management can often be performed effectively across locations. Only 7% of roles required full onsite presence.

Skills Demand

42% of roles with skills data

Low

High

Skills insight: Among 42% of tracked roles with skills data (249 roles), stakeholder management (25%) and JIRA (21%) are the most requested capabilities, followed by project management (19%), Agile (18%), and risk management (18%). The top skill pairs, Agile + JIRA (10%) and Risk management + Stakeholder management (10%), suggest employers value candidates who combine process methodology with tooling proficiency. Emerging skills include AI (6%) and SQL (7%), which may indicate a growing expectation that delivery professionals can engage with data-driven decision-making and AI-assisted workflows.

Market Context

1.SF information sector continues net job losses despite AI investment San Francisco's information sector lost approximately 4,500 jobs (around 4%) over the past year, even as AI-related investment surged. The market is characterized as 'low hire, some fire,' suggesting that AI-driven productivity gains have not yet translated into broad-based delivery hiring. (SF Standard, January 2026)

2.Mobility sector sustains delivery demand in the Bay Area Autonomous vehicle and ride-sharing companies, including Waymo, Uber, and Zoox, remain among the top delivery-role employers tracked in San Francisco. Their presence in the top 15 is consistent with the Bay Area's concentration of mobility R&D operations that require large-scale programme coordination. (SF Standard, January 2026)

3.Return-to-office mandates tightening across tech industry Nearly half of companies surveyed plan to require four or more days in-office by 2026, which may put downward pressure on the 40% remote share observed among tracked delivery roles. Candidates and hiring managers should monitor whether this trend narrows remote availability in coming months. (ResumeBuilder, January 2026)

4.AI fluency becoming a sought-after project and delivery competency Industry analysts report that demand for AI-fluent project and programme managers is outpacing supply, as organizations look for delivery professionals who can govern AI initiatives and integrate AI tools into existing workflows. AI appeared as a requested skill in 6% of tracked postings this month. (PMI/TechTarget, 2026)

5.Remote-first employers report higher retention rates Companies offering remote-first arrangements are seeing approximately 15% higher employee retention compared to those requiring full onsite presence. This may give remote-friendly delivery employers a competitive advantage in attracting and retaining experienced programme managers in a senior-skewed market. (DOXA Talent, 2026)

Methodology

This report analyzes direct employer job postings for Project & Delivery roles in San Francisco during January 2026.

Data collection:

1.Over 500 roles from 340+ employers aggregated from multiple sources
2.Recruitment agency postings identified and excluded (7% of raw data)
3.Jobs deduplicated across sources to avoid double-counting

Classification:

1.Roles classified using an LLM-powered taxonomy
2.Subfamily, seniority, skills, and working arrangement extracted
3.Employer metadata enriched from company databases where available

Limitations:

1.Not a complete census of the market - some roles may not be captured
2.Skills analysis based on 249 roles with skill data (42% coverage)
3.Salary data available due to pay transparency law
4.Working arrangement based on 126 ATS-sourced roles (Adzuna excluded due to truncated descriptions)

Data coverage:

68%

Seniority coverage

Roles with seniority level classified

97%

Arrangement coverage

Roles with working arrangement known

42%

Skills coverage

Roles with skills extracted from description

62%

Employer metadata

Roles with enriched company data

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