FBS Product Owner II

Our Client is one of the United States’ largest insurers, providing a wide range of insurance and financial services products with gross written premium well over US$25 Billion (P&C). They proudly serve more than 10 million U.S. households with more than 19 million individual policies across all 50 states through the efforts of over 48,000 exclusive and independent agents and nearly 18,500 employees. Finally, our Client is part of one the largest Insurance Groups in the world.

Job Summary

Takes the lead more independently in areas of product development by following the principles of Agile to manage the team backlog, anticipate and prioritize needs, oversee development stages, act as a primary liaison and evaluate product progress. Serves as the customer proxy; works collaboratively with business owners and other stakeholders to accomplish these tasks with little to no support and with a higher volume of work. Utilizes strong understanding of the business vision to offer guidance and influence the business owner's requirements. May provide overall leadership to Product Owner team through mentorship and guidance.

Essential Job Functions

• Applies scientific practice within iterations in order to routinely plan, do, check and adjust. Manages team backlog items and prioritizes based on business value.
• Outlines dependencies and informs stakeholders the necessary sequence of development to ensure optimized performance and outcomes.
• Holds a significant role in quality control and is the primary team member empowered to accept stories as done.
• Utilizes strong business knowledge, influence and communication skills to anticipate problems, address them accordingly while working cross functionally in a self-organizing manner to accomplish tasks and effectively manage the backlog.
• Effectively applies critical thinking to identify flexibility in determining how and when each iteration and product element will be developed.
• Acts as primary communicator and connection between stakeholders, end users and teams determining if each story meets their shared expectations.
• Mutually partners with the business and uses effective challenging techniques in order to influence decisions.
• Ensures collaboration from all stakeholders on decisions and strategy providing clear instructions and deliverables for developers.
• Takes ownership for each stage of the process and final product to ensure the goal and vision are correctly aligned with the work items on the backlog.
• Contributes input into the prioritization of the program backlog, coordinates dependencies and manages the inspection and evaluation of product progress through each iteration.
• Assists in the mitigation of program risks. Participates in PO and/or ART sync meetings in addition to the system demo to show critical aspects of the solution Participates in Inspect & Adapt (I&A) workshop to work across teams to define and implement improvement stories to increase program quality.
• A key member of the Agile team who utilizes perspective to define iteration goals and drives execution and delivery with the ability to influence stakeholders.
• Partners with the business owner to understand needs, manage scope and add/eliminate user stories.
• Communicates requirements to Agile Team in a clear and collaborative manner to determine new requirements, negotiate teams and dependencies.
• Regularly interacts with the Product Manager in order to discuss goals and share a clear understanding of the business/value stream vision.
• Heavily involved in the Program Increment (PI) planning, story definition and assists team with story estimates and sequencing.
• Oversees the development of the product to include planning, refinement, review, and execution.
• Partners with stakeholders to identify and organize steps required for next iteration.
• Works to gain clarity on queries and participate in the demo of committed items.
• Participates in ceremonies within the team to coordinate efforts with team to refine the process, identify areas for improvement and support the execution of tasks.
• Continuously keeps the end-user needs in mind based on on higher level of business acumen.
• Ensures the solution meets expectations and the development delivers expected outcomes from the accepted stories.
• Provides mentorship and guidance to PO I.
• Performs other duties as assigned.

Requirements

• Bachelor's degree preferred.

• Product Owner, Scrum Master, or Product Manager Certified.

• 1-3 years experience in an Agile environment or 3-5 years in a project environment required.

• 1-3 years leadership experience preferred (influencing and guiding, not necessarily a people manager)

• Fluent English

• Insurance Experience preferred

Software/Tools

• Office Suite – Intermediate (1-3 Years)

• Rally (or equivalent, such as Jira) – Intermediate (1-3 Years)

• Microsoft Excel

Skills

• Strategic Planning

• Stakeholder Analysis & Alignment

• Prioritization

• Change Management

• Communication

• Leadership

• Critical Thinking/Decision Making

• Collaboration

• Prioritization of Work

Benefits

Competitive salary and performance-based bonuses

Comprehensive benefits package

Career development and training opportunities

Flexible work arrangements (remote and/or office-based)

Dynamic and inclusive work culture within a globally renowned group

Private Health Insurance

Pension Plan

Paid Time Off

Training & Development

Note: Benefits differ based on employee level.