Mirko Jurcan
Los Gatos,CA
Summary
Proven leader with a track record of success at NASA and in the U.S. Army, bringing 15+ years of experience in operations, product management, and partner support. Skilled in cross-functional stakeholder engagement, data analysis, information architecture, compliance, and policy implementation. Known for optimizing processes through systems thinking and applying both quantitative and qualitative methods to improve products and services. Committed to scalable operations, risk mitigation, and delivering stakeholder satisfaction.
Overview
15
15
years of professional experience
1
1
Certification
Work History
Product Operations Lead, Program Specialist
NASA Ames Research Center
08.2023 - Current
- Serve as a strategic lead for NASA’s product operations team, aligning cross-functional initiatives with agency-wide objectives to ensure seamless support and delivery across partner-facing platforms.
- Recipient of the NASA Agency-level Career Achievement Medal for sustained excellence in product operations leadership. Developed a scalable support model that increased user support capacity by 160%, boosted staff efficiency by 46%, reduced median response times by 70%, and cut implementation turnaround to under 2 days from 8+.
- Manage intake and triage of new issues, optimizing team workflows while translating system-level requirements into actionable implementation plans.
- Define and document system functionality and component interfaces, ensuring accuracy and consistency across partner support tools.
- Facilitate regular team syncs, 1:1s, and feature deep dives to promote best practices, align on support standards, and coordinate system outages.
- Lead kickoff and retrospective meetings, gathering feedback to identify quality gaps and integrate continuous process improvements.
- Provide frontline insights on partner needs and behaviors to inform product strategy, enhance support programs, and drive adoption across initiatives.
Product Operations (Senior Researcher)
NASA Ames Research Center Via. SJSURF
08.2020 - 08.2023
- Served as the operational liaison for NASA’s Human Systems Integration Division, supporting mission planning, administrative activities, and readiness reviews for ISS operations, including risk mitigation and ensuring Launch Commit Criteria (LCC) compliance.
- Collaborated with stakeholders across ISS, SLS, Orion, EGS, and HLS programs to define requirements, assess success criteria, and recommend software configurations and workflow enhancements for risk management systems.
- Conducted qualitative and quantitative user research—including usability testing, A/B testing, and storyboarding—to validate application behavior and inform system improvements.
- Supported cross-functional research initiatives by advising on system usability, data integration, and workflow design; contributed to policy recommendations and implementation in alignment with NASA and partner directives.
- Participated in contingency response efforts, communicating unexpected issues and resolutions under time-sensitive conditions.
- Led and executed integration testing to ensure system performance met customer expectations and mission requirements.
Project Associate (Research Associate)
NASA Ames Research Center Via. SJSURF
11.2018 - 08.2020
- Collaborated on day-to-day development effort and maintenance operations for Mission Assurance Systems (MAS) and DIg-IT (Data Integration Information Technology)
- Identified and implemented product and process improvements in collaboration with UX designers, developers and QA
- Coordinated changes in project scope and schedule with relevant stakeholders
- Fulfilled scrum master duties; Supported Project Manager by tracking schedule-based task estimates
- Supported maintenance, migration, and creation and documentation of processes of internal knowledge base tools (e.g
- Bug tracker, design documentation)
- Maintained, organized, improved group's internal knowledge base
Operations Manager
Pacific Breeze Mechanical
11.2016 - 11.2018
- Managed an operating budget of $3M+ with company total revenue exceeding $8M+
- Grew Installation/Technician team by ~15 team members
- Developed onboarding procedures
- Developed an OSHA compliant monthly/quarterly safety training schedule
- Validated all equipment and supply purchase orders that supported jobsites and created a vehicle maintenance program that reduced costs
- Supervised four direct reports, ~55 indirect
Data Analyst
Apple Maps, Apple, Inc. via. Pro Unlimited
04.2014 - 09.2015
- Performed ad hoc and structured data analysis, evaluation, assessments and reported data quality
- Ran evaluation tools to ensure data integrity
- Provided feedback to software development teams
- Worked with development team on creating and evaluating application test tools
- Communicated detailed analysis to internal stakeholders for decision-making purposes
- Supported creation of and reviewed technical specifications
Operations Supply Chain Manager
United States Army
06.2010 - 11.2013
- Selected to serve as the Senior Supply Sergeant during the 63rd Ordnance Company's deployment to Camp Leatherneck, Afghanistan from a battalion sized element.
- Maintained 100% accountability of equipment worth over two hundred and two million dollars ($202 Million) OCONUS
- Maintained company level hand receipt worth in excess of nine million dollars ($9 Million), and a TPE Hand Receipt worth in excess of fifteen million dollars ($15 million) OCONUS
- Conduct convoy threat assessments; secured requisition transport throughout theater.
Education
Bachelor of Science - Business Management
San Jose State University
Skills
- Operations Planning & Management
- Project planning and development
- Customer service
- Stakeholder management
- Policies and procedures implementation
- Scrum/Agile methodologies
- Risk analysis and management
- Trello
- Airtable
- MS Office Suite
- SQL
- Python
- HTML
Awards
- NASA Honor Award- Career Achievement, Product Operations (2024)
- NASA Group Achievement Award- Exploration 1 Artemis Simulations (2019)
Certification
- Project Management Professional (PMP)
- Certified Scrum Master (CSM)
- Jira Administrator
- Jira Service Desk Administrator
- Confluence Administrator
- Brazillian Jiu Jitsu Purple Belt (Caio Terra)
Clearances
- SF-85 (Current)
- SF-86 (SECRET, Expired 2021)
Volunteer Experience
- Santa Cruz County District Attorney - Neighborhood Court Panelist
- Sacred Heart Community Service
- Mentors & Meetups
- Paladin Drones
Timeline
Product Operations Lead, Program Specialist
NASA Ames Research Center
08.2023 - Current
Product Operations (Senior Researcher)
NASA Ames Research Center Via. SJSURF
08.2020 - 08.2023
Project Associate (Research Associate)
NASA Ames Research Center Via. SJSURF
11.2018 - 08.2020
Operations Manager
Pacific Breeze Mechanical
11.2016 - 11.2018
Data Analyst
Apple Maps, Apple, Inc. via. Pro Unlimited
04.2014 - 09.2015
Operations Supply Chain Manager
United States Army
06.2010 - 11.2013
Bachelor of Science - Business Management
San Jose State University
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