Product Owner

Highmark Health; Pennsylvania; Hybrid; USD 94,000 - 151,000; Full time

Job summary

Highmark Health seeks a seasoned Product Owner to lead development and management of a service or analytic product within a business unit. You will partner with cross-functional teams to translate strategy into agile execution and ensure business value through focused requirements and backlog discipline.

You will oversee priority, scope, and validation of work to deliver a quality product, aligning with leadership and stakeholders on the roadmap and delivery of key outcomes.

Qualifications

• Requires 3 years in Product Ownership or related product development/management roles.
• Preferred Agile certification from Scrum.org, SAFe, Scrum Alliance, etc.

Responsibilities

• Contributes to streamlining program priorities while maintaining feature integrity.
• Breaks down features into user stories with stakeholders for backlog health.
• Translates product manager's vision into business and functional requirements for teams.
• Maintains a prioritized backlog with acceptance criteria and definition of ready/done.
• Collaborates on the product vision, strategy, and roadmap with stakeholders and leadership.
• Represents the product in governance meetings and tracks status for leadership.

Skills

Product ownership

Communication skills

Matrixed organization

Requirements translation

Backlog sizing

Prioritization

Agile methodologies

Problem solving

Education

Bachelor's degree

Master's degree preferred

Job description

JOB SUMMARY

This job is accountable for the development and product management of a service and or analytic product within the organization with a unique focus on the applicable business unit. The incumbent is the primary point of contact to agile, large cross-functional teams on behalf of the customer to identify the product requirements for development. The incumbent is accountable for the product's ability to produce business value by focusing on the translation of strategy to agile execution. Oversees priority, scope and the validation of work that is required in order to deliver a quality product. Will need a deep understanding of the product, the market, business strategy and operating model. Accountable for the alignment with product management leadership, direct stakeholder involvement and support of the primary business objectives for the organization.

ESSENTIAL RESPONSIBILITIES

• Contributes to streamlining the execution of program priorities while maintaining the conceptual and technical integrity of the features or components for the team.
• Manages, understands and supports prioritized Portfolio and Value Stream work by collaborating with stakeholders such as: Solution Architect, Business Architect, Product Manager and others to breakdown features into user stories.
• Act as a bridge to connect the product and development teams by translating the product manager's vision into business and functional requirements for the teams.
• This will allow the teams to work with a heavy focus on user outcomes.
• Key player in solution estimation.
• Maintain a well groomed and prioritized backlog sufficient to support optimal team allocation for multiple (3+) Sprints including acceptance of stories and enforcing definition of ready and definition of done (backlog health).
• Recommend resolution paths to domain leadership when/if backlog health becomes insufficient.
• Responsible for the acceptance of stories as “Done” from the team, ensuring that the stories have been developed, tested, and meet the defined acceptance criteria
• Collaborate as needed with stakeholders (e.g. Product Management, business leads, etc.) in the creation, maintenance, and communication of the product vision, strategy, and roadmap.
• Represent the product in team or minor level governance meetings.
• Track and provide status to leadership.
• Perform work necessary with product managers to learn about what problems they are aiming to solve with the product.
• Collaborate with external vendors to align roadmaps, ensuring delivery execution and scope alignment.
• Work on cross-functional teams, leveraging agile program and team metrics to drive success.
• Contributes to the generation of a high-level release plan with the team.
• Continually re-prioritizes team's tasks based upon new information, discussions with stakeholders, and probability to drive business outcomes.
• Develop and maintain product delivery roadmap.
• Effectively communicate product release contents and expected product capabilities/behavior to stakeholders.
• Write clearly defined user stories for new product features, issues and future enhancements.
• Work with the team to define and implement improvement stories that will increase the quality of the program.
• Review, update and sign off on test scripts for both in-track and regression testing, ensuring full coverage of the user stories.
• Other duties as assigned or requested.

EDUCATION

• Required Bachelor's Degree in Business Administration, Marketing, Healthcare Discipline, Information Management, or closely related field
• Substitutions None
• Preferred Master's Degree in Business Administration, Marketing, Healthcare Discipline, or Information Management

EXPERIENCE

• Required 3 years experience in Product Ownership, Strategic Consulting or Design Thinking OR in Product Development & Management, Project/Program Management
• 3 years experience working with external clients/fostering positive relationships and outcomes Preferred None

LICENSES OR CERTIFICATIONS

• Required None
• Preferred Agile certification from a known vendor (Scrum.org, SAFe, Scrum Alliance, etc.)

SKILLS

• Communication skills, ability to work in matrixed organization Translate business requirements into technical specifications Ability to "size" work for estimation / planning Ability to serve as product owner for multiple teams / products Ability to prioritze across stories / resources / teams / products Agile methodology Able to problem solve in conjunction with distilling research and applying to reach a relevant and beneficial solution
• Languages (Other than English) None
• Travel Required None

PHYSICAL, MENTAL AND WORKING CONDITIONS

• Position Type Office Based
• Teaches / trains others regularly
• Occasionally Travel regularly from the office to various work sites or from site-to-site
• Rarely Works primarily out-of-the office selling products/services (sales employees)
• Never Physical work site required
• No Lifting: up to 10 pounds
• Constantly Lifting: 10 to 25 pounds
• Occasionally Lifting: 25 to 50 pounds
• Never

Never Disclaimer: The job description has been designed to indicate the general nature and essential duties and responsibilities of work performed by employees within this job title. It may not contain a comprehensive inventory of all duties, responsibilities, and qualifications required of employees to do this job. Compliance Requirement: This position adheres to the ethical and legal standards and behavioral expectations as set forth in the code of business conduct and company policies. As a component of job responsibilities, employees may have access to covered information, cardholder data, or other confidential customer information that must be protected at all times. In connection with this, all employees must comply with both the Health Insurance Portability Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) as described in the Notice of Privacy Practices and Privacy Policies and Procedures as well as all data security guidelines established within the Company’s Handbook of Privacy Policies and Practices and Information Security Policy. Furthermore, it is every employee’s responsibility to comply with the company’s Code of Business Conduct. This includes but is not limited to adherence to applicable federal and state laws, rules, and regulations as well as company policies and training requirements.

Pay Range Minimum: $94,200.00 Pay Range Maximum: $151,000.00 Base pay is determined by a variety of factors including a candidate’s qualifications, experience, and expected contributions, as well as internal peer equity, market, and business considerations. The displayed salary range does not reflect any geographic differential Highmark may apply for certain locations based upon comparative markets.

Highmark Health and its affiliates prohibit discrimination against qualified individuals based on their status as protected veterans or individuals with disabilities and prohibit discrimination against all individuals based on any category protected by applicable federal, state, or local law. We endeavor to make this site accessible to any and all users. If you would like to contact us regarding the accessibility of our website or need assistance completing the application process, please contact the email below. For accommodation requests, please contact HR Services Online at [e-mail] California Consumer Privacy Act Employees, Contractors, and Applicants Notice Highmark Health is a national, blended health organization that includes one of America’s largest Blue Cross Blue Shield insurers and a growing regional hospital and physician network. Based in Pittsburgh, Pa., Highmark Health’s 35,000 employees serve millions of customers nationwide through the nonprofit organization’s affiliated businesses, which include Highmark Inc., Allegheny Health Network, HM Insurance Group, United Concordia Dental, HM Health Solutions and HM Home & Community Services. Highmark Health’s businesses proudly serve a broad spectrum of health-related needs including health insurance, health care delivery, population health management, dental solutions, reinsurance solutions, and innovative, technology solutions.