Product Strategist

Greetings, intrepid and resourceful one. You have stumbled upon a role on our delivery teams that is unlike any other. It has an ambitious set of responsibilities, requires a diverse set of skills, and provides an excellent opportunity to grow professionally. Product Strategists (our internal role similar to Product Managers) at Myplanet are cross-functional individuals that are one part Project Manager, one part Product Owner, one part ScrumMaster, and one part Client Manager.

You will be the person our client most typically works with on a regular basis. You will collaborate with the client and our multi-disciplinary teams to set the vision for each product or project, and translate that vision into a strategy with a prioritized backlog that the team will then execute upon. You’ll ensure the team has what they need to drive the project forward, and work closely with other internal teams and stakeholders at Myplanet to make sure that all the ts are crossed and the is are dotted for a smooth delivery.

Is the role a fit for you?

The Product Strategist role emphasizes exceptional interpersonal skills, adept task planning and management, and a thorough understanding of product and project lifecycles in the context of professional services. Our Product Strategists are extremely detail-oriented; show us you are too by telling us the last live event you attended via your resume or cover letter.

You’ll be most content in this role if you:

• Want the opportunity to work with clients in large enterprises and are able to easily establish trusting relationships with individuals
• Have the ability to run workshops with and facilitate decision-making for various groups of individuals that often have competing goals
• Enjoy creating a plan as much as executing on it to create tangible value
• Have a design or technical background, and are passionate about combining the power of design and development in an iterative fashion
• Are open to getting your hands dirty and learning about various parts of the business which include business development, account management, and production delivery
• Able to juggle a number of responsibilities at any given point in time, and play different roles on the team and projects if necessary
• Have a positive outlook, great composure, love to solve problems and share knowledge
• Very nice to have: Experience with Lean Startup methodology and designing product experiments, validating product ideas, and analyzing product-market fit

Responsibilities

• Work with a team of UI/UX designers and developers to create strategic solutions that balance user goals, technical feasibility, and business objectives
• Work with the production team to gather, distill, and synthesize digital product requirements through forms of research that include (but are not limited to) contextual inquiries, usability studies, surveys, competitive analysis, and remote research. Translate these requirements into a product backlog, and groom continuously
• Facilitate the appropriate activities and meetings (i.e. workshops, planning, demos) for the defined project engagement, and ensure production of the necessary artefacts (presentations, story-maps, etc.) is completed
• Manage the relationship with the client throughout the project, help stakeholders reach across the enterprise to ensure the product and UX efforts succeed, while acting as the main point of contact between the client and the team
• Continuously engage the client, other stakeholders, and the team to ensure the team is building the right product and therefore delivering the value expected of each engagement
• Produce product release and project plans, ensure the customer voice is present throughout the product development lifecycle, and ensure that there is shared knowledge around progress and blocks throughout
• Ensure the delivery of our services is within the agreed upon scope, quality, schedule, and budget
• Report and manage internally on a regular cadence the status of the team and project, identify issues and escalate accordingly
• Support our Startup Operations group with staffing, scheduling, and other operational planning
• Work with our business development team throughout the sales process to help define and scope the engagements, as well as identify further business opportunities with our clients

Performance & Growth Expectations

• Your work as a member of the client services team will be measured by your ability to help deliver projects, manage client and team expectations, and facilitate activities to drive deals from sales all the way through to delivery
• Your ability to understand our delivery methodology and engagement types, user-centered design, and technologies of choice will provide you the opportunity to work on larger engagements with an impressive client roster
• You will be measured along with other team members using our 360-degree system that measures individuals based on their functional competencies (the what you do) and operational competencies (the how you do it)

Benefits & Perks

• Explore ongoing opportunities for professional development: training, conferences, certifications, and in-house peer mentorship
• Experiment with new techniques, wear multiple hats, learn about new disciplines. Our environment is not your average, hierarchical professional services firm: we emphasize accountability for outcomes, but autonomy in activities
• Pursue independent projects, explore new ideas, and challenge yourself to become a thought leader in your field with 5 days of dedicated Awesome time
• A path to ownership – Participation in our company stock options plan and the ability to be an owner in the company
• Work from a modern, ergonomic space complete with standing/sitting desks and an open-concept social atmosphere