Sr. Product Owner

Sr. Product Owner (experience in manufacturing or industrial environments)

Location: This role is onsite in New York City at least 3 days per week.

Rate: DOE

Length of project: 3-6 months, with potential to extend

Product Owner – Role Description

The Product Owner plays a pivotal role during the initial phase of the project, ensuring that the product vision is firmly grounded in the real needs, workflows, and expectations.

·   Act as a senior, client‑facing Product Owner, serving as the primary point of contact for business stakeholders and operational users.

·         Define and own the product vision, ensuring alignment with manufacturing, customer service, and quality process requirements.

·         Engage directly with on‑site operational teams through workshops, interviews, and observation to understand workflows, constraints, and value drivers.

·         Translate business and operational needs into a structured product backlog, story maps, and a clear product roadmap.

·         Steer solution development in close coordination with UX, engineering, and delivery teams across multiple locations.

·         Ensure ongoing alignment between client expectations and delivery execution, supporting prioritization, trade‑off decisions, and scope clarity.

·         Support implementation activities by providing product guidance, validation, and decision‑making throughout the delivery lifecycle.

What you will bring:

·         Senior‑level experience as a Product Owner in manufacturing or industrial environments.

·         Strong client‑facing posture with demonstrated experience working directly with operational and executive stakeholders.

·         Hands‑on experience with MES and/or ERP systems in a manufacturing context.

·         Prior experience in the luxury industry or high‑end manufacturing environments.

·         Proven ability to work effectively with distributed, international delivery teams.

Role and Responsibilities

1.       User Engagement & Needs Understanding

•  Conduct in-person interviews, observations, and workshops with artisans, supervisors, and operational staff at the New York atelier.

•  Deeply understand daily workflows, constraints, pain points, and value drivers to define a product aligned with the reality of atelier operations.

•  Serve as the primary voice of the atelier during the early vision-setting phase.

2. Co-Construction of the Product

•   Work collaboratively with atelier users to translate qualitative insights into clear product expectations.

•   Facilitate co-design sessions to validate early concepts, prioritize value, and ensure the product naturally integrates into the atelier’s daily operations.

•   Partner with UX/UI teams to shape initial journeys, wireframes, and experience principles.

3. Backlog & Product Structure

•   Build the initial product backlog, ensuring that every item is grounded in real user needs and business priorities.

•   Define and maintain early story mapping to structure the product around end-to-end atelier workflows.

•   Establish the foundational product roadmap, covering the MVP scope and subsequent evolutions.

4. Alignment & Vision Setting

•  Ensure alignment between Van Cleef & Arpels stakeholders, the New York atelier, and the delivery team.

•  Clarify long term ambitions: designing a scalable product that can be deployed to additional ateliers with minimal adaptation.

•  Document key product assumptions, boundaries, and success criteria.

5. Transition to the Operational Proxy Product Owner

•   At the end of the 10 weeks on site immersion, hand over a fully structured and validated product vision to the Proxy Product Owner based in France.

•   The Proxy Product Owner, present from the first day of the project, will support the discovery phase and then take charge of day-to-day delivery activities, including backlog refinement, sprint preparation, decision making, and support to the development team.