Techniques for uplink transmission management in a wireless communications system are described herein. An example method may include receiving an explicit uplink grant that indicates one or more implicit uplink grants. In an aspect, the example method may include performing a first clear channel assessment (CCA) in response to the explicit uplink grant in a first time slot. In another aspect, the example method may include, if the first CCA fails, sequentially performing one or more additional CCAs respectively in one or more time slots subsequent to the first time slot in response to the one or more implicit uplink grants, and transmitting the PDU over the unlicensed or shared spectrum and in a time slot subsequent to the time slot in which one of the one or more additional CCAs succeeds.