What are the responsibilities and job description for the Product Owner position at MetLife?
General Information
City/Cities
Bridgewater
State(s)
New Jersey
Country
United States
Working Schedule
Full-Time
Work Arrangement
Hybrid
Travel Required
10%
Relocation Assistance Available
No
Posted Date
07-Nov-2023
Job ID
1013
Description and Requirements
Role Value Proposition:
This Product Owner (PO) opportunity is focused on leading two scrum teams on the Life Agile Release Train. This PO will work closely with Life Claims operations, the Total Control Account Product team, Life Product, and the FEGLI team. These teams have objectives and key results (OKRs) which are critical to business achieving strategic goals.
A background in all, or any, of these business groups is preferred, whereas knowledge of working within agile is not required, and can be trained. This is a great opportunity to join Life Product and learn the agile framework. Agile translates simply to delivering business value more efficiently, with the ability to pivot quickly to re-prioritized solutions.
The PO is responsible for prioritizing the stories to be developed by the agile team so the team can incrementally develop valuable solutions that maintain conceptual and technical integrity. A story is a short description of a small piece of desired functionality written from the business user’s perspective.
Individuals in this role are also responsible for working in a team of agile teams that contribute to larger solutions. While they collaborate with their agile team members to define stories, the PO has the responsibility for prioritizing the Team Backlog to streamline execution. The PO has the responsibility for accepting the team’s work as done. As such, you help the team realize its commitment to quality. You provide complete visibility into processes, priorities, and workflow, and ensure it is sequenced correctly. You create shared understanding and clarity to reduce operational friction and provide the team with a clear view of their environment.
This is a critical role with significant accountability to build and manage relationships and responsibilities across businesses stakeholders and within the team. POs work closely with the Scrum Master, Product Management, Customers, Business Owners, team members and other stakeholders to create viable and sustainable plans, and constantly seek feedback from multiple stakeholders and incorporate it into the solutions.
POs share accountability with Product Managers for delivery outcomes and make decisions to solve product related problems. You lead the creation of business scenarios and supporting details for stories and related testing, so they are clearly understood by fellow team members.
As needed, you will work with Product Managers, to slice epics into features, and with the team as a content expert, partner to create and prioritize stories. POs strategically solution at the team level in service of the broader ART-level solution, and do so by partnering with Product Management and other Product Owners within the ART.
POs are effective at helping the team deliver on its commitments by: working with others to actively explore solution options, ensuring decisions are taken by those with accountability for delivering outcomes, and dedicating their effort to delivering value, that meet the needs of MetLife’s customers and our business goals.
Key Responsibilities:
The Work:
1. Work with Product Managers and business partners to understand customer needs and business objectives that inform features and stories
2. Ensure work focuses on those stories with a maximum value, aligned with product strategy, roadmap, and key milestones
3. Help define, refine, prioritize, and accept the work delivered by an Agile team to ensure the outcome meets the defined feature acceptance criteria while the team works at a sustainable pace
4. Answer questions from the agile team so the team’s work flows without delay.
5. Collaborate with POs on other teams to help the ART achieve its shared objectives.
6. Make decisions to solve product related problems, trade-off discussions, to stay on track to committed
outcomes. (Acceptance, prioritizing, making trade-offs, etc.)
The Interactions:
1. Collaborate with the team to create viable and sustainable plans
2. Manage stakeholders’ expectations through iterative demonstrations of completed work
3. Hold the team accountable for what has been defined as set criteria, receiving, and incorporating feedback
from multiple sources
4. Active interaction with Product Managers, fellow POs, and other partners to protect the integrity of the solution
Essential Business Experience and Technical Skills:
Able to take all forms of input and synthesize (not influenced by “hierarchy”) – Seek Diverse Perspectives
Willing to observe, analyze, and make recommendations - Seek Diverse Perspectives
Communicate factually. Navigate conversations to align on a set of data inputs that drive identification and prioritization of work.
Take ownership, influence at all levels, access all stakeholders equally (don’t ask for permission) – Seize Opportunity
Maintain stability throughout the iterations and add appropriate feedback as needed – Enable Solutions
Understand that they don’t have to be the technical expert but can work with the team members to understand and prioritize technical stories – Enable Solutions
Able to identify, access and connect among key stakeholders and experts - Seek Diverse Perspectives
Know how to get things done through others, and provide the clarity needed to accomplish it – Deliver what matters
Driven and motivated by our customers and the business to focus on the right outcomes – Deliver Results
Able to make decisions on information that is available at that time. Be comfortable with progressive elaboration and discovery (Progress over perfection) – Manages Ambiguity
Product Owners are primarily leaders not managers. POs do not direct the team but see themselves as a member of the team and are able to adapt their leadership approach to enable and empower the team to solve problems and deliver outcomes.
Some POs may have direct reports on an exception basis based on the needs of the ART – Empowerment & Collaboration Experience with Life Claims, Total Control Account, and/or FEGLI systems and processes is desired. Experience with SAFe Agile framework is not necessary as this can be trained. Knowledge of other group benefit products, operational processes and systems is also a benefit.
GG11M
The wage range for applicants for this position is $84K to $112K. This role is also eligible for annual short-term incentive compensation. MetLife offers a comprehensive benefits program, including healthcare benefits, life insurance, retirement benefits, parental leave, legal plan services and paid time off. All incentives and benefits are subject to the applicable plan terms.
Contact: Bernadette Jones Recruiter bernadette.jones@metlife.com
Salary : $84,000 - $112,000
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