Product Manager

About the Role

Our client is currently seeking to appoint a Product Manager for a long-term contractual engagement. The work is performed remotely, with an initial contract length of 12 months and a possible extension of another 24 months. Australian citizenship and a Baseline security clearance are prerequisites for this role.

Role Overview

The Product Manager will work within the Transformation Branch, which defines products as the complete value streams of client schemes. In this role, you'll collaborate closely with business owners to implement new schemes and enhance existing ones, prioritizing valuable ideas and addressing critical challenges that align with the agency's strategic goals. Your focus will be on aligning stakeholders and ensuring the delivery of solutions that meet user needs, business goals, and feasibility constraints.

Key Duties and Responsibilities

• Drive strategic planning for significant projects and programs with agency-wide impact.
• Offer specialist professional or technical expertise relevant to the agency's Change Program.
• Foster and manage strategic relationships and alliances with internal and external stakeholders, business leaders, and service providers.
• Engage and consult with internal and external experts to exchange ideas, seek advice, and achieve positive results.
• Identify and handle specialized risks associated with complex activities and challenges.
• Prepare reports on program goals, outcomes, and performance metrics.
• Provide strategic leadership to a work area by developing business plans, defining strategies and priorities, and monitoring workflow and performance.
• Maintain comprehensive knowledge of the scheme, its value stream, user needs, and relevant technology or maintain an overall understanding of the platform and its capabilities.
• Support the delivery of change initiatives that involve new schemes or capability enhancements within existing schemes.
• Collaborate with business owners to identify and prioritize improvements in IT and non-IT capabilities aiming to enhance end-to-end user and stakeholder experience.
• Manage a backlog of ideas and coordinate with other Product Managers to prioritize and communicate a transparent roadmap outlining how initiatives contribute to strategic goals.
• Lead discovery and epic refinement processes to determine feasible solutions balancing user desirability, business viability, and delivery constraints.
• Work collaboratively to strengthen shared capabilities and minimize duplication of bespoke solutions.
• Enable and support Product Owners and multidisciplinary teams by building relationships and providing guidance that allows for decision-making within established guardrails.
• Track the progress of product implementation or improvements, manage or escalate issues as needed, and communicate status updates to stakeholders.

Required Skills and Knowledge

• Strategic and outcome-focused mindset, capable of translating organizational priorities and user demands into clear product strategies with measurable success indicators.
• Exceptional stakeholder engagement and influence skills to build consensus, negotiate compromises, and communicate with senior leaders and delivery teams effectively.
• Strong cross-functional leadership skills to guide multidisciplinary teams without formal authority, fostering collaborative evidence-based delivery.
• Competence in evidence-based decision-making, including interpreting data and making timely, well-informed recommendations.
• In-depth knowledge of the scheme, regulatory frameworks, and industry landscape to anticipate impacts and align product direction with policy, operational requirements, and user needs.
• User-centered research and discovery expertise to lead investigations, identify balanced solutions, and accelerate feedback cycles with early assumption testing.
• Ability in product planning and prioritization for managing vision, roadmaps, and backlogs in dynamic environments.
• Technical and system literacy to comprehend system and data flows and effectively collaborate with technical teams.

Additional Information

• Location: Remote work.
• Contract Length: Initial 12 months with a possible 24 months extension.
• Mandatory Requirements: Australian citizenship with Baseline security clearance.

Contractor Benefits

• No payroll processing fees.
• Insurance coverage.
• Options for salary packaging and flexible salary arrangements.
• Prompt salary payment, typically the day after approved timesheet submission.
• Support for learning and development.