Product Owner

WorkNovas LLC; Lansing (MI); On-site; USD 85,000 - 120,000; Full time

Job summary

WorkNovas LLC in Lansing, MI is seeking a Product Owner to lead discovery, define goals, and own the backlog in an Agile environment. You will work with business owners, account managers, and delivery teams to ensure delivery aligns with strategy.

The role requires collaboration across analysts, developers, testers, and UX, guiding requirements, acceptance criteria, and release readiness. On-site 4 days a week in Lansing.

Qualifications

• Experience in product discovery and backlog management.
• Proven ability to work with cross-functional teams.
• Strong communication of goals and requirements.
• Familiarity with Agile ceremonies and planning.

Responsibilities

• Lead product discovery with stakeholders to identify problems and opportunities.
• Set product goals and maintain the roadmap; act as SME for domains.
• Serve as product decision authority and resolve conflicting stakeholder needs.
• Own and prioritize the product backlog based on value, risk, and dependencies.
• Collaborate with analysts, developers, testers, architects, and UX to assess solutions.
• Lead backlog refinement; ensure user stories, acceptance criteria, and rules are clear.
• Represent the product in Agile ceremonies and coordinate priorities across teams.
• Review increments to ensure delivery meets acceptance criteria and business needs.
• Track product metrics to evaluate adoption, impact, and value delivered.
• Identify opportunities to improve products and processes within scope.
• Oversee AI initiatives within domain scope with proper oversight.
• Sign off on story cards and defect fixes before migration to production.
• Assist with basic SQL queries to validate product behavior and investigate data issues.

Skills

Product ownership

Agile backlog

Stakeholder management

Roadmapping

SQL basics

Job description

Product Owner

Lansing MI x4 days

Primary Responsibilities

• 1. Lead product discovery with business owners, customers, account relationship managers, operational teams, and other stakeholders to identify customer problems, business opportunities, product needs, and desired outcomes.
• 2. Establish and communicate the product goal for an assigned product, capability, or domain, and maintain the roadmap within approved organizational strategies; operate as a subject matter expert for one or two assigned domain areas.
• 3. Serve as the product decision authority for assigned scope by resolving conflicting stakeholder needs, evaluating alternatives, communicating tradeoffs, and escalating decisions that exceed delegated authority.
• 4. Own and continuously order the product backlog based on customer value, business benefit, operational impact, risk, regulatory requirements, dependencies, and delivery constraints.
• 5. Collaborate with Business Analysts, developers, testers, architects, user-experience professionals, and other delivery partners to evaluate business and technology alternatives and identify enterprise impacts and constraints.
• 6. Lead backlog refinement and ensure user stories, acceptance criteria, business rules, and intended outcomes are sufficiently understood by the Agile team.
• 7. Represent the product in Agile ceremonies and sprint, release, program, and roadmap-planning activities; coordinate sequencing, dependencies, and implementation of priorities across teams.
• 8. Review completed increments and determine whether delivered work satisfies product intent, acceptance expectations, and business needs; lead or support demonstrations, readiness activities, implementation planning, communications, and training.
• 9. Ensure agreed product measurements are tracked and evaluate product adoption, customer impact, operational performance, product quality, incidents, and realized business value using product metrics and analytics.
• 10. Identify and lead opportunities to improve products, customer experiences, and business processes within the bounds of assigned product authority (typically one or two domains based on team assignments).
• 11. Implementation of approved AI initiatives within assigned domain scope, including prototypes and domain-specific roadmaps, with appropriate human oversight and compliance.
• 12. Be accountable for final signoff on story cards and defect fixes before migration to production, confirming acceptance criteria, business readiness, and release alignment.
• 13. Support creation and execution of basic SQL queries to validate product behavior, confirm acceptance criteria outcomes, and investigate routine data issues in partnership with Business Analysts and engineering teams.