Product Owner, Potato Contracting & Receiving

McCain Foods; Toronto; Hybrid; CAD 97,000 - 130,000; Full time

Job summary

An established industry player is seeking a Product Owner to spearhead digital transformation in agriculture. This role involves collaborating with global teams to enhance potato contracting and receiving systems, ensuring a seamless experience for growers. You will drive user-centric solutions, manage product roadmaps, and leverage data to improve decision-making. Join a company committed to sustainability and innovation, where your contributions will significantly impact agricultural practices and technology integration. If you thrive in a dynamic environment and are passionate about agri-tech, this opportunity is perfect for you.

Benefits

Bonus eligibility

Flexible work hours

Travel opportunities

Diversity and inclusion initiatives

Qualifications

• 5+ years as a product owner in agri-tech with a focus on digital products.
• Strong understanding of technology's role in agriculture and data management.

Responsibilities

• Partner with leaders to create a vision for transforming potato contracting.
• Lead technology teams to implement new systems and improve data quality.

Skills

Product Management

User-Centric Design

Agile Methodologies

Communication Skills

Interpersonal Skills

Business Acumen

Project Management

Data Analysis

Education

Bachelor’s Degree in Food, Engineering, Business, Computer Science, IT

Tools

SAP

Salesforce

Outsystems

Job description

Position Title: Product Owner, Potato Contracting & Receiving

Position Type: Regular - Full-Time

Position Location: Toronto HQ

Requisition ID:35027

We know the importance that food plays in people's lives – the power it has to bring people, families and communities together. Our purpose is to bring enjoyment to people’s lives through great tasting food, in a way which reflects our values. McCain has recently committed to implementing regenerative agriculture practices across 100 percent of our potato acreage by 2030. Ask us more about our commitment to sustainability.

OVERVIEW

McCain is embarking on a digital transformation. As part of this transformation, we are making significant investments into our data systems, structures and policies, and building digital products for our customers, key suppliers and McCain team members to enable digital processes and data-driven automation over time.

Our Technology team’s goal is to inspire growth through innovative technology experiences. Our digital teams are key to delivering this ambition. McCain has established digital teams in Manufacturing and Commercial and we are now looking forward to expanding our investments in Agriculture embedded in how we manage our potato contracts and receiving details to the plant.

McCain is looking for a Product Owner with a strong knowledge of the marketplace of agri-tech/science solutions with a proven track record of successfully delivering digital products in an Agriculture context for a global organization.

PURPOSE

Data is at the heart of how we do Agriculture at McCain. We are looking for a Product Owner to execute on our technology ambition to deliver potato contracting and receiving solutions that will improve Growers experience working with McCain and improve the visibility, quality and supply of potatoes being delivered to the manufacturing plant.

The Product Owner develops and refines overarching strategy and sets courses for a specific use case creation and application. Working closely with growers and field representatives (end-users), our Agriculture business and technology teams, and the Sr. Director Digital Agriculture, the Product Owner identifies end-users needs to scope and iterate on specific use case development, leveraging technical input to develop and implement best-in-class solutions.

RESPONSIBILITIES

Reporting to the Sr. Director, Digital Technology Agriculture you will:

• Partner with global and regional commercial leaders of McCain to co-create a multi-year vision & roadmap to digitally transform our legacy Potato Contacting and Receiving system and business processes across the McCain global organization.
• Lead and direct Technology teams to support execution of the prioritized initiatives, leading to deprecation of legacy systems once needs are achieved in new systems.
• Establish KPIs and measures to track the progress and report the deliverables of technology initiatives.
• Continually improve customer data quality & enrichment to enable prioritization of sales and service initiatives.
• Digitize to simplify commercial processes and embed data-led decision making and insights to enable continual improvement.
• Infuse knowledge of technology trends and competitor activity into decision making.
• Work closely with the Digital Technology teams for application development, data and AI, platform and infrastructure, and McCain’s Commercial Product Management team and leaders to digitize and codify agricultural practices.

Product Management

• Build user-friendly tools & solutions that will drive user adoption & engagement.
• Understand key user pain points and current day-to-day processes that will be impacted by owned use cases.
• Bring a UX/UI-centric approach to solution development and deployment, seeking iterative feedback from stakeholders and adjusting strategy accordingly.
• Establish a clear vision and define success.
• Work with business stakeholders to prioritize problems to solve and regions to deploy.
• Establish a user feedback process with plants that gets incorporated into product plans.
• Proactively explore industry trends and advancements in technology to identify new and leading solutions that will significantly impact the achievement of the business objectives and move McCain ahead of the competition.
• Identify opportunities within the business to improve or provide data & insights to enhance decisions or facilitate agility.

Technology Delivery

• Develops, owns, and executes product roadmap.
• Translates product roadmap features into well-defined user stories and acceptance criteria.
• Works in an Agile environment and continuously reviews the business needs, refines priorities, outlines milestones and deliverables, and identifies opportunities and risks.
• Participates in the development process with the development team and external partners to deliver product changes.
• Work closely with Data and Analytics teams to deliver AI and data-led solutions.
• Prioritizes and maintains the backlog for assigned products, balancing the requirements of stakeholders.
• Partners with product stakeholders to define the user experience.
• Identifies change management impacts to end-user community and collaborates with respective stakeholders to manage/mitigate.
• Ensures data & Insights are available to create actionable outcomes to the ultimate customer.
• Develops and maintains appropriate tracking and reporting of product performance post-launch to evaluate future investment.
• Understands Product roadmap risks, issues, and blockers actively assists with issue resolution.

IDEAL EXPERIENCE AND SKILLS

• Minimum of 5 years of experience working as a product owner or in a product management capacity in the agri-tech industry (with evidence of progressive roles).
• Good business acumen, understands how to drive value through the use of technology and data.
• Experience managing complexity and ambiguity.
• Experience in user-centric design and user interface development.
• Knowledge of SAP/ Salesforce solutions, Outsystems, and custom application delivery.
• Proven ability to work collaboratively across levels and functions internally and with third parties.
• Experience in leading projects preferably in a global environment.
• Experience working within an agile project delivery framework and demonstrated skill in project management.
• Behaviors and Attitudes
• Experienced and can speak with credibility on Product Management principles, user-centered design, and agile methodologies.
• Strong interpersonal skills.
• Strong communication skills: is able to effectively and persuasively communicate to various audiences including plant management or operators level.
• Strong time management skills, and ability to stick to pre-determined timelines.

OTHER INFORMATION

• Hours of work are a regular 40-hour work week, Monday to Friday, with the potential for extended work hours based on business needs.
• Travel: required.
• Hybrid role: 2 days in office per week. This may fluctuate depending on work to be done.

EDUCATION

• Bachelor’s Degree in food, engineering, business, computer Science, IT, or a related field.

Compensation Package: $97,500.00 - $130,000.00 CAD annually + bonus eligibility.

The above reflects the target compensation range for the position at the time of posting. Hiring compensation will be determined based on experience, skill set, education/training, and other organizational needs.

McCain Foods is an equal opportunity employer. We see value in ensuring we have a diverse, antiracist, inclusive, merit-based, and equitable workplace. As a global family-owned company we are proud to reflect the diverse communities around the world in which we live and work. We recognize that diversity drives our creativity, resilience, and success and makes our business stronger.

McCain is an accessible employer. If you require an accommodation throughout the recruitment process (including alternate formats of materials or accessible meeting rooms), please let us know and we will work with you to meet your needs.

Your privacy is important to us. By submitting personal data or information to us, you agree this will be handled in accordance with the Global Privacy Policy.

Job Family: Information Technology
Division: Global Digital Technology
Department: Digital Ag
Location(s): CA - Canada : Ontario : Toronto || CA - Canada : New Brunswick : Florenceville-Bristol

Company: McCain Foods (Canada)