Product Owner

MHR; Newcastle upon Tyne; On-site; GBP 60,000 - 78,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Training courses

GP access

Family leave

MHRewards

Recognition program

Referral bonus

Social events

On-site restaurant

Private medical insurance

Dental coverage

Job summary

MHR is seeking a Product Owner to turn validated product ideas into delivery-ready work for engineering teams. You will co-define epics with the Product Manager, own the delivery structure, and ensure acceptance criteria reflect market outcomes, not just engineering output.

Collaborating with Engineering Managers, Tech Leads, developers, and UX, you will shape the backlog, drive sprint planning, and maintain delivery momentum while upholding quality through robust UAT planning and timely release

Responsibilities

• Turn validated product ideas into delivery-ready work for engineering teams.
• Translate epics into a prioritised backlog and define clear story-level criteria.
• Lead sprint planning, backlog refinement, and reviews with engineering and UX teams.
• Define UAT approach, coordinate testing, and act as quality gate for delivery.

Job description

At MHR, our employees are central to our success and play a key role in helping customers achieve sustainable high performance. With a team of over 900 professionals, we work to make things flow smoothly, whether it's for large organisations or individual employees. As businesses face rapid changes in the world of work, our team is here to help them adapt and thrive.

By focusing on the core needs of efficiency, productivity, growth, and impact, our employees use their expertise to deliver real solutions through our People and Finance platform. This system, which covers finance, HR, payroll, and learning, helps businesses run more smoothly and make better decisions in real time.

With over 40 years of experience behind us, MHR’s track record as a high-performance organisation is built on clear goals, a shared vision, and strong communication - all of which we pass on to our customers.

MHR is more than just a place to work; it’s a platform for empowerment. Joining us means bringing innovation, technology, and teamwork seamlessly removes obstacles, enhances your skills, and allow you to focus on what’s most important to you- work that matters.

With us, you’ll grow, find your flow, and make a lasting difference in your career, your team, and your impact.

Your Career

As a Product Owner, you will turn validated product ideas into clear, delivery-ready work that engineering teams can build, test, and release with confidence. Working closely with the Product Manager, you will co-define epics, own their delivery structure, establish cross-departmental acceptance criteria, and ensure the definition of done reflects the complete market outcome - not just the engineering output.

You will translate epics into a credible, prioritised backlog, working with engineers to shape technical stories and defining clear story-level acceptance criteria before work enters a sprint. You will also establish the UAT approach, coordinate testing, and act as the quality gate for delivery, ensuring that nothing is accepted as complete until it meets the agreed criteria at both story and epic level.

Your Team

You will build strong, trust-based partnerships with Engineering Managers, Tech Leads, developers, and UX colleagues. You will work closely with engineering on sprint execution, priorities, dependencies, and trade-offs, ensuring the backlog remains stable, well understood, and delivery-ready at all times.

You will facilitate sprint planning, backlog refinement, and sprint reviews in collaboration with the development team. You will coordinate with UX to ensure design artefacts are ready before stories enter a sprint, and you will provide the clarity, context, and decisions needed to keep delivery moving without avoidable blockers.

Your Impact

You will be accountable for delivery effectiveness within the domain, including predictability, throughput, quality, and the successful acceptance of outcomes. You will own UAT planning, coordination, execution, and sign-off, while maintaining visibility of delivery metrics such as velocity, cycle time, defect rates, and sprint progress. You will use these measures, alongside team feedback, to identify risks early and continuously improve delivery performance.

You will maintain the core artefacts that create delivery confidence, including epic and story acceptance criteria, sprint planning inputs, UAT plans and results, delivery metrics, backlog health reporting, release notes, and scope change records. By combining a strong delivery instinct with attention to detail, clear communication, and sound judgement, you will help ensure that product work is built to a high standard and delivered as a complete, valuable outcome for customers.

Benefits to support you personally and professionally

Alongside the opportunity to work with an incredible team and express your individuality, we offer a range of personalised benefits including:

• Access to over 60 internal training courses, professional qualifications, and cross-departmental mentoring and coaching programs
• 24/7 access to a GP through Help at Hand for you and your family, confidential mental health support, and paid sick leave
• Ability to purchase or sell additional holiday days beyond 25 days and bank holidays
• Enhanced Family leave
• My MHRewards offering discounts at over 900 retailers
• Monthly employee recognition program and departmental awards
• Referral bonus scheme of up to £2,000
• Employee-led social events such as running clubs, football teams, book clubs, and bake-offs
• On-site subsidised restaurants offering a variety of fresh meals daily
• Opt-in benefits schemes such as private medical insurance and dental coverage

We value the well-being, financial stability, and inclusivity of our employees, and strive to provide a supportive working environment.

At MHR, we’re completely committed to creating a supportive and inclusive workplace where all voices are heard, and everyone feels valued and supported.

Whatever your background, abilities and experiences, if you’re excited by this role we want to hear from you. If you require assistance for an interview, please let us know and we’ll make sure your needs are met when you arrive.

If we receive an exceptionally high volume of applications, we reserve the right to close this vacancy earlier than originally advertised.