Product Owner

What will you do?

This career opportunity is available in Broker Solutions for the role of Product Owner, who will be based in Cape Town.

What will you do?

This role represents the business across multiple forums and business areas to ensure prioritization and delivery of the business strategy and priorities through a portfolio of change initiatives. 

The Product Owners responsibilities span across the domains of business product, platform/channel and system (IT solution); and across the full development life-cycle from prioritization, define & design, development, integration, testing & training, delivery into the teams (both internally and business partners) and benefits realization. 

This role work very closely with the leadership team of the Business and contribute to Santam’s overall objective of profitable growth.

What will make you successful in this role?

• End to end accountability for product, platform/channel and systems (IT solutions) with intentional drive for value and innovation.
• Demonstrate the ability and understanding to facilitate integration of products, platforms and systems, processes into the broader Santam strategy.
• Identify the future capabilities (People, Product, Process and Technology) that will enable the strategy; and defining a multi-year roadmap for delivery of capabilities.
• Actively participate in change initiatives and projects by providing vision and direction to the development teams and stakeholders throughout the initiative/project and create business requirements.
• Responsible for defining, prioritizing, evaluating and inspecting the work generated by delivery teams to ensure delivered features and functionality is supportive of realizing the future business strategy.
• Research and analyze the market and best practices; follow our competitors and the industry.
• Assess value, develop use cases, and prioritize stories, epics and themes to ensure work focuses on those with maximum value that are aligned with the strategy and defined outcomes.
• Lead the planning of business and IT solution release plans and set expectation for delivery of new functionalities. Responsible for the creation of a single prioritized backlog of value-based outcomes. Responsible for facilitating and leading the change.
• Implement best practice initiatives to improve service levels, ensure cost efficiency and effectiveness, and ultimately deliver business value. Includes meeting quality standards and practices. Manage deviation from such standards.
• Facilitate a Business Product Owner and Subject Matter group across business areas to inform the business requirements. Play a leadership role in the Change Agents network within BU and across the business.
• Work closely with all business units including BITS delivery organization. Participate as active member of the teams and decision-making groups. Monitors progress and stakeholder satisfaction on delivery of value. Deploy capabilities into operational business. Balance scope, budget, and time, weighing priorities according to the needs and objectives.
• Provide an active role in mitigating impediments (risks, issues, constraints, blockers) impacting successful team completion of release/sprint goals.
• Define business cases for capabilities, in support of realizing the strategy. Drive, track and realize benefits from various initiatives. Ensure operational practices and processes are aligned within the BU objectives of profitable growth. 
• Ensuring a consistent service experience for all parties of in the business.
• Identify, diagnose and recommend improvements to be undertaken with the various business areas, providing appropriate and effective solutions.
   

Qualification and Experience

• Business related degree or studying towards degree essential.
• Min 10 years’ experience in Financial Services Industry.
• Min 10 Years STI (Short Term Insurance) industry experience.
• 5 years STI Business Management Experience at senior level.
• Systems Implementation Experience. Recommend knowledge of Agile approach and principles.
• Proven track record of continuous improvement.
• Operations management experience. 
• Experience working in Agile and specifically Scrum environments.

Knowledge and Skills

• Agile methodologies and implementation practices
• Financial management proficiency. Solid understanding of budgets and variance reporting.
• Outstanding communication, presentation and leadership skills.
• Sharp analytical and problem-solving skills. 
• Creative thinker with a vision and ability to conceptualize. 
• Knowledge of client journey and client experience management and measurement.

Personal Attributes

• Collaboration
• Client focus 
• Drives results 
• Flexibility & adaptability 
• Cultivates Innovation
• Critical Thinking
• Quality Decision-making
• High levels of emotional intelligence
• Demonstrate Agile values (Collaboration, Innovation, Nimble mindset)

Our commitment to transformation

Santam is the market leader in the general insurance industry in Southern Africa. We are a large, diversified, expanding and transforming company and whilst based in South Africa, we are rapidly moving into a number of emerging markets, both in Africa and Asia. 

Our success is rooted in our passion for our clients and everything we do is centered on our delivery of Insurance Good and Proper. We’re about people. People drive our business so it follows that we want to recruit the best people possible whether they work for us permanently or for a short time as temporary employees. 

At Santam we are committed to transformation and embracing diversity. This commitment is what drives us to achieve a diverse workplace with employment equity as a key goal to create an inclusive workforce, representative of the demographics of our society. In achieving our employment equity goals we give preference to applicants from the designated groups in alignment with the Divisions Employment Equity targets.