Product Owner III

Role Purpose

We are seeking a dynamic Product Owner to join our Strategic Partnerships, New Business Development & Customer Innovation team. As part of this external, digitally focused team, you will play a pivotal role in driving customer innovation and new opportunities to fuel the Shoprite ecosystem. The team's mission is to unlock alternative revenue streams through new strategic initiatives, partnerships and strategic investments.

In this role, you will support and lead the delivery of innovative solutions, working closely with cross functional stakeholders to identify and develop new ventures that align with our long-term growth strategy. Your focus will be on transforming ideas into tangible products, driving value creation and ensuring alignment with business objectives to grow and diversify Shoprite's ecosystem.

The Product Owner III is a member of the agile team, responsible for defining user stories and prioritizing the team backlog to streamline the execution of program priorities while maintaining the conceptual and technical integrity of the features or components for the team. The role engages and collaborates with product management to execute the product vision, strategy and roadmap.

Role Description

• Lead the design of any new feature (“continuous exploration”) and work with business stakeholders to design the optimal user experience and assess the impact on the On Demand backend. This includes but is not limited to:

o Facilitating workshops to gather the feature's requirements o Creating wireframes of the optimal user experience o Engaging business stakeholders to review the user experience and obtain their input and sign-off

o Working with designers to ensure the UI created by them aligns to the wireframes and feature requirements

o Documenting the impact of a user experience on data models, business logic and business rules with the various On Demand microservices (backend) affected by the change. This can include:

▪ Context diagrams

▪ System/data flows

▪ Tables summarising scenarios that impact business logic

▪ High-level system integration requirements (incl. data fields required in request and response payloads), etc.

o Reviewing integration specifications (IFS) from Functional Analysts to ensure that they address all requirements originating from the user experience

• Provide input into the refinement of the program backlog, ensuring the team is familiar with the features being brought into PI planning, collaborating with program management in the refinement of the backlog and keeping them informed of progress in achieving team PI objectives.

• Continuously refine and sequence the product backlog:

o Gather the requirements for the product and capture them in the form of a product backlog, consisting of user stories with acceptance criteria.

o Ensure all user stories are written and that each user story has acceptance criteria.

• Provide visible, transparent and clear direction, ensuring the development team is clear on priorities:

o Provide clear solution direction to the agile team.

o Apply economic decision making. o Sequence user stories based on team PI objectives. 

o Balance PI objectives with local team requirements. 

o Ensure team backlog readiness for next iteration.

o Include the team in backlog refinement.

• Participate in ART level events: ART sync, Product Owner Scrum of Scrums, Inspect and Adapt, PI Planning, daily stand-ups and system demos.

• Help create a release plan and track progress towards the release of a product.

• Drive mobile digital omnichannel customer engagement based on customer preference and omnichannel strategies.

• Ensure a consistent and delightful customer experience across all digital touchpoints of the Shoprite customer journey.

• Provide strategic input to customer experience improvements that help drive customer acquisition, customer retention, and conversion.

• Actively promote and advocate product features and customer-first product design.

• Adhere to and improve customer service levels across businesses and service.

• Provide integrated reporting and feedback.

• Test new features in the staging environment (user acceptance testing) to provide business signoff

• Engage at a senior level with respect to customer centric product concepts and best practices.

• Serve as a subject matter expert to guide product development.

• Coach and support junior and mid-level product owners in their development.

Qualifications and experience

• Degree in Business, IT, Engineering, Marketing or another relevant field – (essential).

• Certified Product Owner / certified SAFe Product Owner – (essential).

• +6 years' experience in a Lead or Senior Product Owner role, with experience working in an agile team and proven success launching new and complex product features and translating business strategy and analysis into successful consumer products – (essential).

• Extensive experience collaborating across multi-disciplinary teams to deliver complex projects (essential).

• Depth of understanding and experience with analytics and big data – (essential).

• Strong commercial experience in digital led business development environments – (essential).

• Customer user and loyalty experience – (essential).

• Knowledge of legal compliance (POPIA, Electronic Information Act, etc.) – (essential).

• General marketing or retail experience – (desired).

• Exposure to the African digital market and customers – (desired).

Key competencies and work ethic (consolidated for advertising)

• Independent, motivated self-starter with a focus and determination to persevere in a challenging, fast paced environment to achieve high-quality results.

• Excellent problem-solver and analytical thinker with the ability to focus on what's most important, balance technical constraints, maximise product value and deliver a differentiated product. Considers new solutions to increase product value while verifying the business value delivered by the product and how it aligns with the strategy.

• Strong product focus and expertise with end-to-end product optimisation – Translates market and customer feedback into strategic requirements, driving product delivery through an agile release process while leading execution across development and product management. Brings top quality expertise to manage product requirements, deliver product optimisation and introduce new tools and practices.

• Customer focused – Passionate about creating value for customers. Translates customer needs into meaningful experiences, taking a proactive approach to anticipating future customer needs.

• Business acumen – Understands company-wide KPI tree; understands company business models, goals and strategies and how they impact on commercial viability and profitability.

• Collaborative partner – Effectively leverages the collective intelligence of the team; reaches objectively good negotiation results while maintaining collaborative relationships. Models the company values.

• Stakeholder engagement skills – Anticipates and aligns stakeholder needs across business areas.

Communicates and aligns the vision and strategy across product and technology teams; engages with stakeholders on the product development process and product management mindset.

• Leadership and influencing skills – Empower and inspires others to deliver their best; identifies conflicts or roadblocks quickly and resolves them independently; creates an atmosphere of enthusiasm and commitment; coaches and supports junior and mid-level product owners in their development.

• Communication skills – Strong communication and moderation skills; writes thought-leadership communications; comfortable preparing and giving presentations to large, senior audiences.

• Is curious and adaptable, finds agile and rapid ways of implementing innovative solutions fast. High degree of comfort with ongoing technological and organisational change. 

Our Group and all its operating companies is committed to creating, embracing, and preserving a diverse workplace that values the unique talents, perspectives, backgrounds, and abilities that enrich our organisation. A place where everyone matters and feels included.

We are committed to Employment Equity when recruiting internally and externally.

Please take note that by responding to this application and providing your personal information, you confirm your express and informed consent for Shoprite Checkers (Pty) Ltd and all its subsidiaries and affiliates companies to process your personal information for the Company to consider your application for this position. All Personal Information which you provide to the Company will be used and/or retained only for the purposes for which it is collected, whereafter it will be permanently destroyed. Your information is only retained if it is required by law or where you have given consent to us to retain such information for an extended period.

If you don't hear from us within 14 days, please consider your application unsuccessful. Any personal information collected as part of your application will be destroyed, securely, in accordance with South African legislation.

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