Product Owner Practice Lead - United Kingdom - First Central Services

Description

Location: Gibraltar, Guernsey, Haywards Heath, Home Office (Remote) or Manchester Salary: Up to £75,000 (depending on level of experience) plus excellent benefits package Department: Technology and Data

We're First Central Insurance & Technology Group (First Central for short), an innovative, market-leading insurance company. We protect the things customers love so they can get on with what matters to them in life.

Data drives us. It fuels our outstanding distribution, finance, technology and legal services. Our underwriting skills built on data expertise; it creates the insights we need to give the right cover to the right customers at the right price. But, it's the people inside and outside our business that power us. They make us stand out, help us succeed. We're ambitious. We're growing. We've won awards.

Ambitious team players can make their mark here. Sound like you? You'll fit right in

As the Product Owner Practice Lead you'll be responsible for the leadership of the Product Owner Community of Practice (PO CoP) and will provide coaching and guidance to support Product Owners across First Central. It'll be your responsibility to develop the Product Owner practice and align this across the product owner community and Pillars. Collaboration skills are key as you'll work closely with the Heads of Portfolio and wider business stakeholders and SME's to define and maintain a practice that is focused on driving value from First Central's Technical Products. We're based in Haywards Heath, West Sussex, Salford Quays, Manchester, Guernsey and Gibraltar, w e love hybrid working, so you'll spend most of your time working from home and will only attend the office for team meetings when needed, but of course, it's your choice - if you prefer to be in the office more - that's good with us too.

You'll be the perfect person for us if:

• You are an experienced Product Owner who knows what good looks like.
• You have a passion for coaching and supporting others to become amazing Product Owners just like you.
• Love implementing guidance and rigour around Product Ownership.
• Are a natural leader who can bring people along on the journey of transforming our approach to the practise.

Keeping us on the right track. Together

Job responsibilities:

• Leadership of the Product Owner Community of Practice (PO CoP).
• Provide coaching, guidance and support to all Product Owners ensuring that they are effectively delivering high quality products that meet the business goals.
• Establish and continuously improve the Product Owner practice ensuring that it is well understood and adhered to by all members of the PO community
• Definition of Product Owners standards, practices, and policies as part of the Agile Change Delivery Framework.
• Monitoring their application, working to ensure standards are followed by all members of the PO CoP, throughout the organisation, in order to deliver product ownership services of the highest quality.
• Develop appropriate training materials and development frameworks to support the Product Owner role.
• Definition of the Product Owner service catalogue.
• Regularly engage with the Exec Team and Senior Stakeholders across change disciplines and within the wider business, providing consultative and advisory services.
• Working with the Agile Practice to refine standards in line with the CDF and colleague feedback.
• Facilitate engagement with Pillar stakeholders to ensure product teams understands the role of the Product Owner.
• Perform the role of product owner where required to support the demand across the organisation.
• Instigate, prepare, facilitate and lead meetings, workshops and presentations for a wide range of audiences, demonstrating consistently high qualities of communication and strong powers of influence.
• Document current processes and models to understand inefficiencies or gaps.
• Comply with the requirements, and act in accordance with, the Group Code of Conduct and Fitness and Propriety policies at all times.
• Ensure compliance with Company Policies, Values and guidelines and other relevant standards/ regulations at all times.

Job-specific competencies:

Experience & knowledge

• Proven leadership and management of Product Owners within an Agile environment including coaching and mentoring.
• Proven Product Ownership experience within an iterative and Agile change framework.
• Strong understanding of Agile principles, methodologies, and practices.
• Proven experience of managing a Product Owner team.
• Strong problem resolution, negotiation and influencing skills.
• Proven interpersonal skills and an ability to influence senior colleagues and peers.
• Significant experience in software delivery and working with delivery teams in a product aligned model.
• Strengths in combining rigour and discipline with a pragmatic approach to deliver the highest quality, cost effective features within set timeframes.
• Great at building strong, effective relationships with people from different disciplines.
• Excellent stakeholder management experience, can handle conflicting stakeholder requirements and bring differing points of view together to move them forward.
• Excellent communication and presentation skills, both verbal and written.
• Good understanding of regulatory requirements specific to the Company and the functions under control

Skills & Qualifications

• Excellent leadership, coaching and motivational skills.
• Decisive decision making and proactive approach to problem solving using analytical thinking and emotional intelligence.
• Excellent communication skills with the ability to present information in a clear and concise manner to a variety of audiences, both technical and non-technical.
• Strong interpersonal skills.
• Excellent time management and organisation skills.

Behaviours

• Target driven, results focused, striving to drive improvements across the change and delivery pipeline .
• Strategic thinker.
• Self-motivated and enthusiastic.
• An organised and proactive approach.
• Flexible approach to work and adopts a positive attitude, embracing, embedding, and incorporating the Company values.
• Strives to drive business improvements to contribute to the success of the business.
• Influence and contribute to strategic decision making, ensuring that deliver of change is aligned to business priorities.

Want to know more? Simply download the Job Profile. Sounds like you? Then click on Apply.

What can we do for you?

People first. Always. We're passionate about our colleagues and know the best people deserve an extraordinary working environment. We owe it to them so that's what we offer. Our workplaces are energetic, inspirational, supportive. To get a taste of the advantages you'll enjoy, take a look at all our perks in full here .

Intrigued? Our Talent team can tell you everything you need to know about what we want and what we're offering, so feel free to get in touch.

We're happy to discuss flexible working during the recruitment process.

As part of our Women in Finance Charter pledge, we've committed to having 30% of women in leadership roles by the end of 2023.

86% of people would recommend a friend to work at First Central

Simply Health Cash plan. Reclaim the cost of your eye tests, dental, physiotherapy and more

Flexible Bank Holidays

Eight flexible bank holidays; you can choose which festivals you observe

We're passionate about it. Everyone gets a paid day off annually to volunteer

Electric Car Scheme

Plug into our Electric Car Scheme for a deal with insurance, road tax and servicing

Flexible Working

We're flexible; most roles let you mix office and home working. We work fluidly around core hours

Your Time in Need

Your Time in Need: five days' leave so you can deal with life stuff. We'll support you