Product Owner - Client Communications & Technology

When you join New York Life, you're joining a company that values career development, collaboration, innovation, and inclusiveness. We want employees to feel proud about being part of a company that is committed to doing the right thing. You'll have the opportunity to grow your career while developing personally and professionally through various resources and programs. New York Life is a relationship-based company and appreciates how both virtual and in-person interactions support our culture.

Location:

This is a hybrid position within a commutable distance (approximately 50 miles) of the designated office location: New York or White Plains. Employee will be required to work onsite at an office location 6-8 days a month.

Position Summary

Often the first contact for internal customers looking to deliver a communication solution, the Governance and Planning Senior Associate on the Client Communications Management team serves as an Agile Product Owner responsible for vetting and managing all incoming requests. This includes working closely with internal customers, technical teams, and leadership to facilitate and analyze data to build the team's backlog. Also, the Senior Associate will expedite information around priority (based on funding, criticality, resource capacity, and release schedules) as a part of iterative and quarterly planning. They must have a good understanding of this data and be able to present it accurately to support planning and delivery decisions. Finally, the Senior Associate will be responsible for lightweight project management of larger initiatives which may fall out of scope of the Agile framework.

Once familiar with the team's services, the Senior Associate should be able to draw on past experiences to present potential solutions, both for day-to-day effort as well as for larger, transformational-based change.

Summarized, this role is a hybrid position permitting a range of responsibilities, including product ownership (for an Agile Scrum team) and project management (for more traditional projects). This individual will play a critical role in ensuring leadership has accurate and complete data to make key decisions that impact budgeting, scheduling, assessment of risks/opportunities, and delivery of work. They will work independently with business representatives and technology partners to perform initial assessments of work requests and make decisions on next steps. This requires a solid understanding of the group's services, their processes to create content, familiarity with the technology systems needed for communications, and knowledge of or a desire to learn NYL's many varied products. It also requires a keen ability to identify risks and work with others to mitigate them.

Primary Responsibilities:

• Coordinates and manages work requests (demand) from all lines of business across multiple technology systems
• Supports Agile and Waterfall efforts by way of product ownership, governance, planning, and project management
• Supports strategic and continuous improvement efforts such as process engineering, correspondence transformation/modernization, and tool implementation/upgrade(s)
• Assists with quarterly planning, status dashboarding, and defining/reporting performance metrics
• Uses tools (such as JIRA, Excel, and Smartsheet) to gather, analyze, and present information
• Works to understand key stakeholders, work scope, and dependencies for the requests from each line of business. Understands business drivers for communication requests to help inform ranking and scheduling discussions.
• Leads planning and execution of special projects as well as initial work assessment discussions. Uses best judgement to determine next steps.
• Exhibit excellent planning, organization, facilitation skills to support estimation, scheduling and tracking of work.
• Sets expectations with the businesses and partners during initial work assessments.
• Draws on past experiences and expertise to efficiently conduct initial work assessments and proactively identifies risks and areas of improvement.
• Uses prior knowledge and active management of the portfolio book of work to make decisions such as: identifying items needing immediate attention. Uses judgment and guidance from leadership to determine when other subject matter experts or stakeholders need to be consulted. Manages business expectations related to initial work assessments and overall work status

Qualifications:

• Bachelor's degree strongly preferred
• 3+ years of experience in one or more areas: Working in PMO, Project Management, Product Ownership, Scrummaster, Release Train Engineer
• 3+ years of experience working on Agile Scrum teams
• 3+ years of experience with any one or more of the following: JIRA, Smartsheet, MS Project/Clarity/equivalent, Excel/Powerpoint
• Knowledge of general technology and concepts such as SDLC (software development lifecycle)
• Desired certifications: PMP, Agile/SAFe, or similar

Sales bonus eligible: ((stockPackage))

Click here to learn more about our benefits. Starting salary is dependent upon several factors including previous work experience, specific industry experience, and/or skills required.

Please note: This role requires FINRA licensed and/or FINRA Associated Person pre-hire fingerprinting.

Recognized as one of Fortune's World's Most Admired Companies, New York Life is committed to improving local communities through a culture of employee giving and volunteerism, supported by the Foundation. We're proud that due to our mutuality, we operate in the best interests of our policy owners. We invite you to bring your talents to New York Life, so we can continue to help families and businesses "Be Good At Life." To learn more, please visit LinkedIn, our Newsroom and the Careers page of www.NewYorkLife.com.