Software Product Owner

Software Product Owner 

Judicial Information Services, State Court Administrative Office 

Salary: $74,980.08 - $97,843.68

Judicial Information Services is looking for qualified applicants for the position of Software Product Owner. Reporting to the Product Portfolio Manager, this position provides software product roadmaps and manages the lifecycle of software products and services that Judicial Information Services provides to its customers. This role works with multiple cross-functional teams and functions as an expert on the assigned products including identifying customer needs, advocating for customer needs with stakeholders, and ensuring the solutions provide tangible business value. 

Essential duties include, but are not limited to the following: 

• Manage assigned product and/or service lines lifecycles from developing roadmap to tactical activities, including communicating portfolio and project updates to stakeholders and coordinating with other software product owners. 

• Conduct market research supported by ongoing visits to customers, potential customers, and end users. In collaboration with customers, suggest innovative approaches to solve business problems, and use customer input to guide product /service decisions. 

• Understand and evaluate the competitive landscape and market trends to promote, differentiate, and position JIS products and services to customers and potential customers. 

• Implement and maintain software product management and agile product owner best practices. 

• Serve as the subject matter expert in the relevant product and service domains. 

• Collaborate to create product and service solutions within an Agile Scum framework, including: o Assisting the team in defining value stories, communicating business and customer value to teams. o Assisting in establishing and understanding personas and using them to provide context to scrum teams. o Developing epics and user stories for new functionality. o Grooming and prioritizing assigned product and service backlogs. o Partnering with stakeholders to define minimum viable products that deliver incremental value through an agile approach. o Prioritizing releases and managing associated stakeholder expectations. o Maintaining team focus by effectively managing scope and communicating with stakeholders. o Ensuring continuous engagement with scrum teams during product development lifecycle, clarifying user stories and providing immediate feedback. o Assisting in ensuring new functionality meets acceptance criteria including Gherkin and test/QA support. o Assisting in providing user documentation. 

• Participate and lead staff and customers through new product/service change management functions and attend Change Advisory Board meetings to represent assigned products and services. 

• Provide data and reports to stakeholders on key performance indicators and trends pertaining to assigned products and services. Coordinate communication of completed released to stakeholders. 

• Stay up-to-date on relevant industry trends and technology. 

EDUCATION AND EXPERIENCE: 

• Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, or related field or equivalent combination of education and work experience. 

• 4 years of relevant software product management, product owner, business analyst experience in a software product or service development environment.  

• Proven success delivering software with Agile Scrum methodologies preferred. 

• Agile backlog management tools, such as Confluence, Jira, DevOps, TFS, Aha! 

• Writing user stories. 

• Usability testing. 

• Scrum Product Owner responsibilities. 

Preferred Education and Experience: 

• Electronic content and document management software experience. 

• Certified Scrum Product Owner 

KNOWLEDGE: 

• Agile Scrum framework development lifecycle methodologies and best practices. 

• Strong understanding of software product lifecycle management. 

• Strong understanding of solution development lifecycle. 

• Proficient in use of MS Office tools. 

Preferred Knowledge: 

• Basic understanding of court functions and processes. 

ABILITY: 

• Proven skill eliciting requirements and writing clearly and concisely for different audiences. 

• Facilitate working meetings, elicit and solicit information, and incorporate the information. 

• Facilitate a shared understanding of a problem, possible solutions, and scope of a project. 

• Facilitate solutions to challenges among multiple teams that entail negotiation between multiple business and technical stakeholders. 

• Lead and motivate others. 

• Prioritize and manage multiple tasks with exceptional follow through. 

• Provide excellent customer service, problem solving, and conflict resolution. 

• Demonstrate outstanding interpersonal and written and oral communication skills. 

• Explain technical information clearly to non-technical audiences. 

• Demonstrate intense curiosity and initiative to understand challenges and complex systems and drive to improve those systems. 

• Demonstrate deep empathic skills to promote exploration of insights from many different perspectives and enables ability to detect patterns that yield ideas. 

• Thrive in fast-paced, agile environment. 

• Work flexible hours. 

PHYSICAL REQUIREMENTS: 

• Lift and transport materials, equipment, and supplies weighing up to 45 pounds. 

OTHER REQUIREMENTS: 

• Occasional overnight travel to courts throughout the state. 

WORK LOCATION: Official work-site location is the Hall of Justice, Lansing, Michigan. Remote work may be available in accordance with the MSC/SCAO Remote Work Policy. 

TO APPLY: Please email your cover letter and resume in Microsoft Word or Adobe PDF format to jobapps@courts.mi.gov. Please include “Software Product Owner” in the subject line. If you cannot email applicant materials, please contact Judicial Human Resources (517) 373-1147 for assistance. 

APPLICATION DEADLINE Open Until Filled 

Initial review of resumes will begin Friday, March 29, 2024