Technical Product Manager – Data Focus

Technical Product Manager – Data Focus

Chicago, IL

Hybrid work-from-home, 3 days onsite in the loop, 2 days WFH

Summary

The Technical Product Manager will manage a scrum team in an Agile environment focused on Data initiatives related to Data Engineering and Business Intelligence initiatives, in an Azure, Databricks, Snowflake and Power BI environment (don't need experience in all these areas).

We're looking for someone that has experience with hands on product ownership, to manage a scrum team, drive execution and own Agile ceremonies (standups, sprint planning, backlog refinement) and proactively remove blockers.

Backlog management is an important skill, and looking for Product Managers who take ownership of backlog creation, prioritization, refinement and grooming – and be able to independently decompose technical epics into clear, actionable user stories with acceptance criteria.

And the more experience you have working on data related projects, the better: Data Engineering, Data Platforms, Business Intelligence, etc. But at a minimum, need to have a keen understanding of data concepts, including databases, data structures, ingestion, pipelines and system connectivity

What you'll be doing

• Manage and maintain the product backlog for assigned data platform and business intelligence capabilities, prioritizing work in partnership with engineering leadership and business stakeholders.
• Translate business and technical requirements into epics, user stories, and acceptance criteria, working with engineering teams to clarify scope, feasibility, dependencies, and expected outcomes.
• Coordinate Agile delivery for an assigned scrum team, facilitating sprint planning, backlog refinement, daily stand-ups, sprint reviews, and retrospectives and supporting adherence to established Agile practices.
• Monitor delivery plans, milestones, dependencies, risks, issues, and Agile metrics to identify potential delivery concerns and communicate status to appropriate stakeholders.
• Coordinate activities across data engineering, BI engineering, QA, DevOps, infrastructure, security, and other participating teams to support timely development, testing, and release activities.
• Support product roadmap and release planning by providing delivery estimates, dependency information, technical considerations, stakeholder requirements, and other information necessary to establish priorities.
• Coordinate release readiness activities, including acceptance criteria, testing, user acceptance testing, deployment planning, stakeholder communications, and post-release validation.
• Partner with data and BI engineering teams on the delivery of data platform capabilities, including ingestion pipelines, data transformations, enterprise data models, semantic models, reporting solutions, and self-service analytics capabilities.
• Apply established data quality, governance, lifecycle, and documentation practices throughout product delivery and identify opportunities to improve processes within the assigned area.
• Serve as a liaison between business stakeholders and technical teams, communicating requirements, priorities, delivery status, risks, and technical concepts to support alignment throughout the delivery lifecycle.

Skills we're seeking

• 5+ years of Product Management experience, with hands on project delivery
• Must have experience managing data-focused products as a Product Manager, or have prior technical experience working in a data related role (Data Engineer, BI Developer, Software Engineer, DBA, Data Analyst, etc.)

o Must have a keen understanding of data concepts, including databases, data structures, ingestion, pipelines and system connectivity

o Must have experience translating data-focused business and technical requirements into epics, user stories, and acceptance criteria.

• Must have strong Agile Product Management experience, including managing Scrum teams and a track record of delivering product in accordance with product roadmaps

Nice to haves

• Proficiency with Agile delivery tools such as Jira

Experience with Microsoft-focused data products

Databricks, Power BI other Azure services

• Snowflake experience
• Certified Scrum Product Owner (CSPO), Certified ScrumMaster (CSM), or comparable Agile certification.
• Certified Data Management Professional (CDMP) or comparable data-management certification
• Bachelor's Degree or Master's Degree, ideally in an IT or Data related field