Product Owner

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Co; Boston (MA); On-site; USD 72,000 - 90,000; Full time

Job summary

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Co. seeks a Product Owner in Boston to drive cross-functional development of instructional programs for grades 3–12. You’ll manage priorities within an integrated platform, write user stories, and ensure on-time delivery of features with stakeholders from engineering, design, and marketing.

You will participate in daily Scrums, prioritize work using Pragmatic Marketing guidelines, and sign off features before release, while maintaining educational integrity of products.

Qualifications

• 2+ years participating in or managing cross-functional product development teams.
• Strong organizational and multi-tasking skills.
• Innovative team player with the ability to solve problems proactively and creatively.
• Passion for creating innovative technology solutions for students and teachers.

Responsibilities

• Implement project deliverables and manage priorities to support delivery of high-quality products on schedule.
• Attend daily Scrum meetings, keep Scrum artifacts visible, assist with sprint planning and reviews.
• Determine feature priority using Pragmatic Marketing guidelines and collaborate with stakeholders.
• Sign-off features prior to production release.
• Liaise between project teams and internal stakeholders to align schedules and gather feedback.
• Work with engineering to design, implement, and test features across the platform.
• Share processes with project managers, product managers, and learning architects to improve practices.
• Perform risk assessments to prioritize trade-offs for timely delivery while preserving educational integrity.
• Communicate with internal and external stakeholders to ensure on-time product deliveries.

Skills

Agile methodologies

Cross-functional teams

Sprint planning

Stakeholder communication

Tools

JIRA

Kanban Boards

MS Teams

Job description

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As Product Owner, you will participate in cross-functional product development teams to develop and enhance innovative instructional programs, features, and functionality for striving readers in grades 3 - 12. As a team member, you will manage priorities for specific components within an integrated platform experience. This includes, but is not limited to, the following activities:

• Implement project deliverables and manage priorities to support delivery of high-quality products on schedule that meet customer needs.
• Contribute to Agile product development team as Product Owner, attending daily Scrum meetings, keeping Scrum artifacts visible, helping resolve impediments to the team, and assisting with sprint planning and review meetings. Based on user requirements, write user stories and acceptance criteria, create prototypes and/or wireframes for new products.
• Determine feature priority through Pragmatic Marketing framework guidelines, including field visits, collaborating with Marketing, Research, and other key stakeholders.
• Responsible for sign-off of features prior to production release.
• Liaise between project teams and internal stakeholders (e.g., engineering, editorial/learning architecture, design, marketing, research, QA, etc.) to collect and synthesize feedback, manage/align project schedules, and motivate team.
• Work collaboratively across the engineering organization to design, implement, and test features.
• Collaborate with project managers, product managers, and learning architects to share processes and increase integration of best practices across teams.
• Perform risk assessments and analysis to prioritize and make trade-offs to ensure on time project completion while maintaining educational integrity of products.
• Proactively communicate with internal and external stakeholders at all levels including project documentation, follow up, and status reports to ensure on-time product and/or feature deliveries.

Education and Experience

Required:

• 2+ years participating in or managing cross-functional product development teams
• Strong organizational and multi-tasking skills
• Innovative team player with the ability to solve problems proactively and creatively
• Passion for creating innovate technology solutions for students and teachers

Knowledge and Skills

Required:

• Prior experience working on cross-functional teams utilizing Agile methodologies and project management tools (e.g. MS Teams, JIRA, Kanban Boards)
• Demonstrated success managing projects and leading engineering teams
• Proven success acting as a liaison between technical and business stakeholders
• Knowledge of education technology (K-12) industry, knowledge of ELA reading/intervention market, user experience (educators and students), and classroom needs
• Proficiency with Microsoft Office suite

Preferred:

• Pragmatic Marketing Framework Certification or knowledge
• Agile Scrum Master Certification and/or Instructional design experience a plus

Physical Requirements

• Might be in a stationary position for a considerable time (sitting and/or standing).
• The person in this position needs to move about inside the office to access file cabinets, office machinery, etc.
• Constantly operates a computer and other office productivity machinery, such as a calculator, copy machine, and computer printer.
• Must be able to collaborate with colleagues via face to face, conference calls, and online meetings.

Benefits and Salary Range

Salary Range – $72,000 - $90,000

Benefits - See Career Page - Careers at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company (hmhco.com)

ABOUT US

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (NASDAQ:HMHC) is a global learning company dedicated to changing people’s lives by fostering passionate, curious learners. As a leading provider of pre-K–12 education content, services, and cutting-edge technology solutions across a variety of media, HMH enables learning in a changing landscape. HMH is uniquely positioned to create engaging and effective educational content and experiences from early childhood to beyond the classroom. HMH serves more than 50 million students in over 150 countries worldwide, while its award-winning children's books, novels, non-fiction, and reference titles are enjoyed by readers throughout the world.

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt is an equal employment opportunity employer and participates in E-Verify. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment and will not be discriminated against on the basis of gender, race/ethnicity, gender identity, sexual orientation, protected veteran status, disability, or other protected group status.

Nearest Major Market: Boston

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