Lead Product Owner

About GSS

Hello. Welcome to GSS! We are a Network-Driven Managed Service transforming the global financial system with cutting-edge technology, including AI/Machine Learning and collaboration with top financial institutions. GSS will become the industry default for screening transactions for sanctions risk – through a consistent, standardised, and scalable model. Supported by regulators, trusted by the market. Join us in revolutionising the industry and making a real impact!

About the Role

We're looking for an experienced and highly motivated Lead Product Owner to join us and lead, guide and mentor a team within our growing product department. Reporting directly to the Chief Product Officer, you'll be responsible for defining, prioritising, and delivering innovative product solutions that meet customer needs and drive business value. You'll collaborate closely with Product Management and Technology teams, and lead cross-functional squads to deliver high-impact products aligned with the strategic vision.

What You’ll Do

Key responsibilities of the role include (but is not be limited to):

• Product Strategy & Roadmap: Work with Product Managers to develop and maintain a clear product vision and strategy aligned with company goals. Own and prioritise the product roadmap, ensuring it reflects customer needs, market trends, and business objectives.
• Requirements Gathering & Definition: Conduct in-depth market research, competitive analysis, and user feedback sessions to identify opportunities and define detailed product requirements (user stories, acceptance criteria).
• Backlog Management: Own and meticulously manage the product backlog, ensuring it's well-defined, prioritised, and understood by the development team. Facilitate backlog refinement sessions.
• Feature Delivery: Guide products through the entire lifecycle, from concept to launch and beyond. Lead a cross-functional engineering team to ensure timely and high-quality delivery of features , working closely with them to resolve impediments.
• Stakeholder Collaboration: Act as the primary liaison between business stakeholders, p roduct management , architecture, engineering and operations teams. Communicate product vision, progress, and challenges effectively to all relevant parties.
• Agile Leadership: Champion Agile principles and practices within the team, fostering a collaborative and iterative development environment. Participate in and lead Agile ceremonies (sprint planning, stand-ups, reviews, retrospectives).
• Performance Monitoring & Optimisation: Define and track key performance indicators (KPIs) for your products. Use data-driven insights to identify areas for improvement and optimise product performance.
• Lead with vision: serve as a thought leader, mentor, and coach to a small team of Product Owners and Analysts, fostering their growth, a culture of ownership, collaboration, and continuous improvement and ensuring alignment with product goals and best practices.

Ideal Experience

• 10+ years of experience delivering products, with a significant portion in a senior or lead role, including experience in managing or mentoring a small team of Product Owners.

• Experience in financial services and payments, ideally in a regulatory context.

• Customer-centric mindset with a passion for understanding and addressing user needs.

• Deep understanding of Agile methodologies (Scrum, Kanban) and experience working within an Agile development environment including Proficiency in Atlassian products, particularly JIRA, for backlog management, sprint planning, and reporting.

• Analytically-minded. Ability to analyse data to track product performance, identify trends, and make data-driven decisions is essential.

• Experience delivering SaaS-based and cloud-based solutions, especially AWS.

• Experience delivering low latency, resilient, scalable, secure and cost-effective solutions.
• Experience working with microservice-based solutions (Docker, Kubernetes, Helm, Spring Boot, Java, Python).
• Experience working with Kafka-based solutions.
• Demonstratable understanding of Artificial Intelligence (‘AI’) and the application of AI.

• Exceptional communication, interpersonal, and presentation skills, with the ability to influence and engage stakeholders at all levels.

What You Get in Return:

🚀 Impactful Work: Be part of a growing startup where your contributions make a real difference.

📈 Ownership: Eligible to join our Employee Share Option Plan and take ownership of your future.

🏖 Generous Leave: Enjoy 30 days of holiday (plus bank holidays).

💷 Comprehensive Benefits: Including a generous pension scheme, private medical insurance, and life assurance.

👩‍⚕️ Wellbeing Perks: Access to EAP, YuLife, holistic wellbeing programs, and a Virtual GP for your health and happiness.

🤸‍♀️ Flexibility: Hybrid working environment (we are open to remote working for some roles, please check with us at application) with a ‘work abroad’ policy for up to 4 weeks a year.

👩‍🎓 Learning : Access to Udemy, a learning platform with thousands of top-rated courses to develop both tech and business skills.

Ready to revolutionise finance and have fun doing it? Join GSS where we live by our values: Be Respectful, Be Bold and Take Ownership . Come join us and take your career to new heights!

Diversity statement

We are an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to, among other things, race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age or disability.