Ratings Operations is currently seeking a Product Owner based out of our Manchester office.

The Fitch Ratings Workflow Tribe is a cross functional team responsible for maintaining, enhancing, and building the ratings applications and processes that our credit analysts use to do their jobs. The goal of the Fitch Ratings Workflow Tribe is to deliver continuous improvement, mitigate risks, and identify ways to introduce standardisation and automation within Fitch’s ratings applications and workflows.

What We Offer:

High Visibility: This role offers exposure to senior management and key stakeholders, providing opportunities to influence and drive impactful decisions.

Innovative Environment: Join a team committed to driving continuous improvement, standardisation, and automation, all while fostering a creative and forward-thinking culture.

Collaborative Team: Become part of a dynamic and supportive team that values diverse perspectives and fosters a culture of continuous improvement and innovation.

Professional Growth: Benefit from excellent development opportunities, including the potential to work on diverse projects and gain valuable experience in product ownership within the financial services industry.

We’ll Count on You To:

Support key regulatory data reporting. Oversee the management and delivery of regulatory data reporting, a vital function involving daily data feeds and both recurring and ad-hoc reports. This requires ensuring data accuracy, timeliness, and compliance with regulatory standards, while coordinating effectively with stakeholders to meet reporting obligations.

Lead the Agile squad effectively. Guide the team in setting and aligning sprint goals, ensuring user stories are ready, and supporting the squad to fulfill sprint commitments effectively.

Lead Agile ceremonies and strategic planning. Facilitate key Agile ceremonies such as sprint planning, backlog refinement, and occasionally daily scrum meetings. Additionally, contribute to defining the squad’s strategy and roadmap, ensuring alignment with organisational objectives and the successful delivery of sprint commitments.

Leverage Agile tools. Utilise the Atlassian Suite, including JIRA, Confluence, and Bitbucket, to manage the team’s agile stories and backlog. Additionally, maintain comprehensive team documentation on Confluence to ensure clarity and accessibility.

Coordinate with diverse stakeholders. This role involves liaising with internal compliance and operations teams to ensure a shared understanding of sprint goals and backlogs, as well as engaging with external parties such as regulators. Additionally, collaborate closely with senior business stakeholders to ensure data accuracy and alignment across the organisation.

Manage and prioritise the product backlog. Take ownership of the backlog to ensure effective prioritisation that aligns with business goals. This involves ensuring the timely delivery of all reports the squad is responsible for and managing competing tasks to maintain a well-structured workflow.

Ensure comprehensive process documentation. Supervise the squad’s detailed documentation of all processes and procedures to provide stakeholders with a clear understanding and transparency of the team’s responsibilities.

Drive continuous improvement and innovation. Foster a culture of continuous improvement by identifying opportunities for innovation within the team. Ensure that processes are not only adhered to but also continuously enhanced to meet evolving business needs.

What You Need to Have:

• A Bachelor’s degree is required; a Master’s degree is advantageous.
• 3-5 years of experience managing teams, ideally in an agile or data team environment.
• Strong proficiency in JIRA and Confluence, with a solid understanding of SQL; basic Python knowledge is a plus.
• High-level proficiency in MS Office and O365, including Excel, PowerPoint, Word and SharePoint.
• Strong communication skills for engaging with developers, compliance teams, and external regulators.
• Excellent organisational skills to manage multiple deliverables, with a keen attention to detail.
• Ability to view the business as a customer and translate requirements into technical solutions.
• Capability to create and maintain a backlog and roadmap, prioritising based on business value and technical feasibility.
• Excellent communication skills, adaptable to audiences ranging from senior management and key stakeholders in analytical groups to technical specialists within the squad.
• Ability to achieve results in a high-demand, matrixed organisation.

What Would Make You Stand Out:

• Certified Scrum Product Owner (CSPO) certification or other project management certifications such as PMP or PRINCE2.
• Experience in financial services and Agile data teams.
• Additional certifications or formal training in JIRA or Confluence.
• Flexibility in working hours is appreciated, as this role involves handling time-sensitive data reports.