Senior Product Owner

Custom Software Systems, Inc. (CSS) is seeking an experienced Senior Product Owner (Technical Product Owner). The ideal candidate will bring strong technical product ownership experience, leading product strategy, defining requirements, and developing roadmaps for research collaboration platforms and tools.

One of our clients in Washington, DC, needs a senior product owner for a contractual position.

• Position: Senior Product Owner
• Location: Washington, DC
• Position Type: Contractual position
• Travel: N/A

Job Description:

This role requires close collaboration with business stakeholders, DevSecOps engineers, and platform architects to evaluate technical feasibility, prioritize enhancements, and deliver scalable solutions. Qualified candidates must have a strong understanding of Agile methodologies, developer collaboration tools, and enterprise platform integrations, and the ability to translate complex business needs into actionable technical requirements.

Responsibilities:

• Prepare for and participate in Sprint Planning.
• Collaborate with the team to detail story acceptance criteria and examples in the form of acceptance tests.
• Communicate story detail and priorities and ensure the team aligns and agrees on a final iteration plan.
• Experience using Agile tracking tools (e.g., Jira, Confluence, Azure and DevOps).
• Develop an expert understanding of business and user needs and champion these in the definition of the product.
• A product vision, prioritized roadmap, and technical specifications for research collaboration tooling, traceable from business need through technical delivery
• Feasibility and integration-approach assessments for research-collaboration platform initiatives, guided by insight from business analysts and economists and developed jointly with engineering and platform architects
• Decision logs, meeting minutes, and other process documentation supporting the product workstream.

Product Vision & Requirements

• Define product vision and priorities for research-collaboration tooling and technologies, elicited and validated directly with business stakeholders, architects, and technical SMEs.
• Convert business and research-collaboration needs into clear, actionable technical specifications and user stories.
• Prioritize features and enhancements based on both business value and technical feasibility.
• Maintain requirements traceability from business need through to technical delivery.

Platform & Technical

• Maintain working knowledge of the platforms relevant to external research collaboration—source-control/developer platforms, technical authoring and research-collaboration platforms, and file-collaboration/research-sharing platforms—sufficient to assess integration options and flag technical constraints early.
• Partner with engineering and platform architects to evaluate feasibility and integration approaches (e.g., authoring-platform-to-source-control sync, repository/access models for external collaborators) before decisions are finalized.
• Stay current on the research-collaboration tooling landscape as it evolves and rescope the roadmap accordingly.

Technical

• Evaluate architectural decisions and technical tradeoffs with engineering and platform architects.
• Assess scalability and performance implications of product and tooling choices.
• Make informed decisions on the technology stack and integration approaches (e.g., authoring-platform-to-source-control sync, repository/access models for external collaborators).

Cross-Functional

• Serve as the primary translator between business stakeholders and DevSecOps engineering and platform leads.
• Communicate technical constraints, tradeoffs, and timelines to non-technical stakeholders in plain language.
• Communicate business priorities and external collaborator needs to the engineering teams in actionable terms.

Process & Delivery

• Apply fundamentals of project management, organization, and process mapping to keep product and requirements work on track.
• Maintain clear documentation of decisions, open questions, and requirement changes (e.g., meeting minutes, decision logs).
• Support planning and prioritization discussions with program leadership.

Qualifications:

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• Ten (10+) years of experience in product ownership, technical business analysis, or a related role, ideally in a platform, tooling, or developer-collaboration context.
• Minimum of seven (7) years managing IT projects and performing quality assurance tasks such as user acceptance testing.
• Strong knowledge of DevOps tools and processes.
• Proven track record defining product vision and translating business/stakeholder needs into technical specifications and user stories.
• Experience working directly with business analysts, senior leadership, engineers, or architects to validate feasibility and make technology decisions.
• Working knowledge of source-control/developer-collaboration platforms (e.g., GitHub), technical authoring and research-collaboration platforms (e.g., Overleaf), and file-collaboration/research-sharing platforms.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills; proven ability to translate between technical and non-technical audiences.
• Hands-on experience with AI-assisted development tools (e.g., GitHub Copilot, Claude Code, Cursor) preferred.
• Ability to manage competing priorities across multiple stakeholders.
• Experience using Agile tracking tools (e.g., Jira, Confluence, Azure and DevOps).

Education & Certifications:

• Bachelor's degree in a related field, or equivalent experience.
• At least one of the following certifications:
• Scrum Alliance Certified Scrum Product Owner (CSPO) or equivalent PO certification
• SAFe Agile Certification
• Certified SAFe Product Owner / Product Manager
• Certified Scrum Professional

Preferred Skills:

• Experience supporting a research-collaboration, academic-partnership, or external-stakeholder engagement effort.
• Familiarity with Agile delivery practices (Scrum/Kanban).
• Federal government experience.
• Experience in a DevSecOps or platform engineering environment.
• Employee Benefits:

Custom Software Systems, Inc., offers our employees a competitive benefits package that may include:

• Health insurance
• Health Savings Account (HSA)
• Dental
• Vision
• Long-term disability
• Short-term disability
• Basic term life insurance
• Supplemental term life insurance for employees, spouses, and dependents
• Simple IRA
• Parking/Commuting expense reimbursement
• Training/Education