Product Owner – Strategic Portfolio Management (SPM)

Location: POL-Mazowieckie-Sochaczew

Remote Type: Hybrid

Time Type: Full time

Job Description

Job Purpose

The SPM Product Owner is a critical anchor role within the Mars Digital Technologies Product Operating Model. Serving as the "voice of the business" to the Product team, this role is laser-focused on maximizing the value delivered by the team in the short-to-medium term.

As the Product Owner, you will bridge the gap between business strategy, data quality and execution. This role acts as the ultimate champion, chief advocate and AI pioneer for SPM adoption across Mars. This blended role combines strong business analysis, powerful data storytelling, and stakeholder enablement. You will build a vibrant "heartbeat" of product feature awareness, translating the Product Manager's strategic roadmap into a detailed, prioritized backlog. By collaborating daily with engineering, designing intuitive reports, and showcasing value through engaging demos, you will ensure SPM is being built to simplify and future-proof the ways of working for all Mars Associates.

What will be your key responsibilities?

1. Core Product Owner Anchor Responsibilities (40%)

• Backlog Ownership: Own, maintain, and prioritize the team's backlog to ensure the Engineering Lead and development team are building the right features to drive business value.
• Roadmap Translation: Translate the Product Manager’s strategic roadmap into a detailed, prioritized product backlog that guides execution.
• User Story Creation: Write clear user stories with actionable, well-defined acceptance criteria for the delivery team.
• Ceremony Representation: Represent the needs of global users and stakeholders in all team ceremonies (including sprint planning, daily standups, backlog refinement, and retrospectives).
• Work Acceptance: Hold the empowerment to accept or reject completed work from the delivery team based on defined acceptance criteria and quality standards.
• Daily Collaboration: Work daily with the Product and engineering teams to answer questions, clarify functional requirements, and resolve blockages.

2. Business Analysis, Tooling Advocacy & Demos (30%)

• SPM Champion & Evangelist: Serve as the primary advocate for SPM. Drive user adoption across global Mars teams by passionately promoting the tool’s benefits, capabilities, and success stories.
• Business Analysis & Requirements Elicitation: Leverage strong BA techniques to analyse current portfolio management processes, map user journeys, and translate complex business problems into standard, scalable SPM functional specifications.
• High-Impact Product Demos: Lead regular, highly interactive SPM demonstrations for business stakeholders and champions to showcase newly released features, "art of the possible" capabilities, and best practices.
• Stakeholder Heartbeat & Communications: Design and maintain a consistent communication sprint cadence (e.g., release notes, monthly showcase sessions, and drop-in clinics) to ensure high stakeholder alignment and tool excitement.

3. Reporting, Tooling Stewardship, AI & Governance (30%)

• Reporting & Dashboards: Design, build, and maintain operational dashboards, reports, and Performance Analytics within SPM to provide stakeholders with clear visibility into portfolio health, resource allocation, and execution metrics.
• Data Standards: Take ownership of platform data quality by establishing and maintaining a robust data dictionary and enforcing 'golden standards' across portfolio registries.
• OOTB Architecture: Partner with Enterprise Architects to prioritize Out-Of-The-Box (OOTB) features, minimizing custom code to guarantee platform health and scalability.
• AI & Innovation Stewardship: Evaluate and champion GenAI capabilities (such as Now Assist). Partner with the Mars AI team and key stakeholders to seek advice and ensure native offerings align with Mars AI standards, deploying "right-fit" solutions to automate workflows safely and efficiently.
• UAT & Upgrades: Define and execute robust User Acceptance Testing (UAT) scenarios and test plans to ensure seamless system performance during regional rollouts and bi-annual platform upgrades.
• Spend Awareness: Support the monitoring and analysis of monthly SPM tool usage and licensing data to ensure Mars gets maximum value from its SPM spend.

What are we looking for?

Minimum Qualifications:

• Education: Bachelor’s degree in IT, Business Administration, Project Management, or a related field (or equivalent practical experience).
• Experience: 3–5 years of experience in product ownership, business analysis, or systems implementation, with at least 2 years of direct focus on the platform.
• SPM Domain Knowledge: Strong hands-on understanding of SPM modules (specifically Demand Management, Resource Management, PPM, and workspaces) would be beneficial.
• Agile Expertise: Proven experience working in Agile methodologies (Scrum, SAFe, or Kanban), with a strong track record of writing high-quality user stories and managing backlog tools.
• Stakeholder Management: Outstanding communication skills, with a proven ability to translate complex stakeholder requirements into clear, technical guidelines.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Certified System Administrator (CSA) or Certified Implementation Specialist (CIS) in SPM - beneficial
• Certified Scrum / Product Owner (CSPO), Professional Scrum / Product Owner (PSPO), or SAFe Product Owner/Product Manager (POPM) certification.
• Understanding of the Common Service Data Model (CSDM) desirable
• Experience in a global, matrixed corporate environment (FMCG/CPG experience is a plus).

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