Product Owner

Product Owner Department: IT Development/Support Employment Type: Full Time Location: Milan, IL (4905) Reporting To: Nathan Faith Compensation: $70,000 - $80,000 / year Description As a Product Owner, you will be at the heart of our product development process, acting as the bridge between our business objectives and technical execution. You will be responsible for defining and prioritizing the product backlog, ensuring that the development team delivers features that meet user needs and drive business value. Your role will involve close collaboration with cross-functional teams, including designers, developers, and stakeholders, to translate vision into actionable tasks. You will leverage your understanding of market trends, user feedback, and data analytics to make informed decisions and continuously refine the product. The ideal candidate is an experienced product management professional with a strong grasp of Agile methodologies and technical acumen. They possess excellent communication and analytical skills, allowing them to effectively translate business requirements into technical specifications and make data-driven decisions. With a customer-centric mindset, visionary thinking, and strong leadership abilities, they excel in collaborating with cross-functional teams to deliver exceptional user experiences. Adaptable and meticulous, they thrive in dynamic environments and are committed to continuous improvement and innovation. Key Responsibilities Essential Functions: Lead strategic vision of your product with executive leadership, both from an immediate and long-term perspective. Drive the discovery process through quick assessment of product strategies by understanding needs, satisfaction drivers, performance requirements and business case throughout the value chain/channel structure. Partner with enterprise architect, product owner, business analysis, development, and QA team leads to ensure practices are aligned with the product needs and vision. Function as the product expert for the identified incremental enhancements including ownership of definition/specifications, product positioning, features/benefits communication, product training, and transition to operational management. Monitor industry, technology, and business trends to identify opportunities/threats and benchmarks competitive products to identify sources of competitive advantage. Ensure the development team's work is optimized to deliver optimal business value aligned to strategic vision for the product. Facilitate sprint planning, reviews, and retrospectives to drive continuous improvement. Build strong relationships with business stakeholders and client services teams to assist in managing customer expectations and translate the needs into business solutions. Develop release plans and coordinate with other product owners, scrum teams, and supporting teams such as infrastructure on integrations and deployments. Actively participate in scrum ceremonies to guide the team and make decisions. Analyze product performance using data analytics and make recommendations for improvements. Job Qualifications Education/Certifications: Bachelor's degree in business, Computer Science, or a related field, or equivalent work experience. Preferred Education/Certifications: Product owner certification Experience: 2+ years' experience working with software development projects or implementations, or deep domain-knowledge of a business area and associated software applications. Experience communicating technical concepts to stakeholders and representing business needs to technical teams. Understanding of or experience with business analysis or product owner processes Preferred Experience: Experience with Agile and specifically the product owner role. Experience working with a software development team that was diligently applying Scrum principles, practices, and theory. Skills and Qualification: Knowledge of both theoretical and practical aspects of IT project management Excellent communication, organizational, and leadership skills. Ability to manage multiple priorities and work in a demanding environment. Ability to collaborate with teams that are not co-located. Ability to build relationships at all levels within the organization. Preferred Skills and Qualifications: Working with Jira, Confluence, Aha!, Azure DevOps or similar a plus Working with applications that have users across multiple organizations. Familiarity with core development concepts, such as SDLC, CI/CD, branching/merging, unit testing, automated QA testing, etc. a plus Physical Requirements : N/A Benefits Medical, Dental, Vision, and Life Insurance Flexible Spending Accounts (Medical and Dependent Care) 401(k) Plan with Company Match Generous Paid Time Off 10.5 Paid Holidays Career Development Opportunities Group O