Associate Product Owner

Company Description

Why Wellmark: We are a mutual insurance company owned by our policy holders across Iowa and South Dakota, and we’ve built our reputation on over 80 years’ worth of trust. We are not motivated by profits. We are motivated by the well-being of our friends, family, and neighbors–our members. If you’re passionate about joining an organization working hard to put its members first, to provide best-in-class service, and one that is committed to sustainability and innovation, consider applying today! 

Why Wellmark Technology? Wellmark is building innovative, modern solutions using cutting edge technology. We are driving organizational transformation and business strategy by empowering our technology team to innovate new and elegant solutions to enhance the customer experience. Together, we are leaning into the future, owning the outcome, and driving organizational change to transform how we work. 

Learn more about our unique benefit offerings here. 

Want to know more? You can learn about life at Wellmark here.

Job Description

This opportunity is focused on supporting the data exchange and data transfer needs for multiple product teams and external business partners. This includes complex systems and middleware enterprise service bus (ESB) functionality utilized by a variety of applications across the enterprise. This is crucial to the core of our business. Success in this role will require strong cross-functional collaboration and strategic partnerships. The Associate Product Owner will work closely with various agile teams and will need to effectively collaborate, build consensus, and drive initiatives with key support teams across multiple departments. The Associate Product Owner develops and conveys the product’s vision to the agile team, outlining and prioritizing work based on business value realization metrics. The ideal candidate will prioritize high-value work and align with our program's performance objectives to maximize impact and efficiency.   

Wellmark is in a period of change. We are rolling out formal product teams throughout the organization. This is a brand-new position, and you will help continue the foundational work of defining this ESB product. Our change journey toward adopting agile principles, a product-focused mindset, and a culture of iterative progress will empower our employees to improve the impact on the healthcare industry.

Qualifications

Preferred Qualifications:  

• Prior experience supporting cross-functional teams (either formal or informal). Ability to coach and mentor others through guidance or feedback. Experience with conflict management and resolution. 
• Executive presence and comfortability influencing and gaining consensus among executive stakeholders.   
• Product development, product management, or similar experience that reflects general knowledge of the product development lifecycle (including measurement and management), strategic planning, and ability to collaborate with multi-disciplinary teams to create innovative, data-driven solutions. Understanding of customer (client and member) needs and ability to translate these into competitive products and services.  
• Prior experience in a Product Owner role (either formal or informal) operating within a SAFe organization, including demonstrated experience with agile and/or lean product management competencies of value measurement, optimization, and eliminating waste. Experience using agile requirements management tools (e.g., Jira or Azure DevOps).  
• Strong written and verbal communication skills with the ability to articulate complex information or solutions to stakeholders. Exposure to negotiation skills and techniques.  
• Ability to identify issues or inconsistencies; obtains relevant information, relates and compares data from different sources and identifyies alternative solutions.  
• Demonstrated critical thinking, problem solving/troubleshooting and continuous process improvement skills.  
• Analytical problem-solving skills and attention to detail; ability to identify and approach complex problems from different angles and apply technical knowledge to policies/procedures.  

Associate Product Owner Minimum Required Qualifications:   

• Bachelor's degree or direct and applicable work experience.  
• Minimum 3+ years’ experience in a combination of:  
• Proven project management experience including managing project scope and schedule, utilizing industry standard project management methodologies.  
• Eliciting detailed business requirements.  
• Experience in a change management capacit