Product Owner - Contract

Job Title: Project Manager  

Location: London - Hybrid  

Role type: Contract 

IR35: Outside IR35 

Duration: 2 months (initially) 

Start Date: ASAP 

Who we are:  

We're an award-winning Tech Consultancy, focused in Quality Engineering on a mission to become the UK's #1. 

What we do:  

"Champion and Engineer Quality and Software". Over the past 6 years, we've shaped and transformed our offering so that passion, precision, and attention to every minuscule detail is baked into everything we do. Born from a desire to bring automation expertise to our current and prospective clients, 5 years ago we shaped our offering. 

Project Info:  

We're looking for an experienced Lead Technical Product Owner to support a major UK retail and hospitality technology environment, taking ownership of two key digital products: customer-facing self-service Touchscreens and Kitchen Display Systems (KDS). 

The client operates across multiple product teams and technology platforms, supporting both the customer ordering experience and the operational workflows that enable stores to fulfil orders efficiently. This role offers the opportunity to shape how these products evolve, ensuring customer needs, store operations and business priorities are translated into clear product direction and meaningful improvements. 

You'll own the detailed product roadmaps, prioritised backlogs and discovery activities for both products, working closely with UX, Engineering, Architecture, Store Operations and wider business stakeholders. From improving the touchscreen ordering journey, basket-building and upsell capabilities to enhancing kitchen workflows and order fulfilment, you'll help identify opportunities, validate ideas and make evidence-led product decisions. 

This is a hands-on, technically focused product role where you'll balance strategic thinking with day-to-day product ownership. You'll work within an established portfolio direction, translating wider business priorities and quarterly OKRs into actionable product goals, requirements and measurable outcomes. 

If you're someone who enjoys working at the intersection of customer experience, technology and operational delivery, this is an opportunity to influence products used in a complex, multi-site environment and help shape their future direction. 

What we’re looking for:  

We're looking for someone who combines strong product ownership experience with a solid understanding of technical architecture, integrations and customer-facing technology. 

You'll be comfortable owning complex products, managing competing priorities and translating business and operational needs into clear requirements that engineering teams can deliver against. You'll understand the importance of discovery and validation, using customer insight, store feedback and product data to challenge assumptions and ensure decisions are grounded in evidence. 

You'll also be a confident stakeholder manager, able to influence across multiple teams, navigate technical dependencies and make informed trade-offs between customer experience, business value, operational needs and technical constraints. 

This isn't a traditional project management role focused on schedules and delivery governance. We're looking for someone who takes ownership of the product direction, roadmap, backlog and outcomes, working in close partnership with Delivery teams who retain responsibility for planning and execution. 

You'll need to be:  

• An experienced Product Owner. You'll have a proven track record of owning complex digital products, translating business priorities into detailed product roadmaps, prioritised backlogs and clear product goals. 

• Technically minded. You'll understand how hardware, software, APIs, data flows and integrations work together within a wider technology ecosystem, and be comfortable working closely with Engineering and Architecture teams. 

• Customer-focused. You'll have experience improving digital customer journeys, using research, user feedback and product data to identify friction and validate opportunities for improvement. 

• Experienced in product discovery. You'll be confident defining problems, developing hypotheses, gathering evidence and validating ideas before committing to development. 

• Skilled in requirements and backlog management. You'll be able to translate customer, operational and business needs into clear requirements, user stories, acceptance criteria and measurable success criteria. 

• Comfortable with complex integrations. You'll understand the dependencies between customer-facing products, POS systems, payments, menus, pricing, product availability and wider technology platforms. 

• Confident working with UX and Engineering. You'll collaborate with UX Designers to research, prototype and test customer journeys, while partnering with Engineering and Architecture to ensure product requirements are technically viable. 

• Strong at stakeholder management. You'll be confident influencing senior stakeholders, challenging assumptions constructively and balancing competing priorities across business, customer, operational and technical teams. 

• Outcome-driven. You'll understand how to translate quarterly OKRs and wider business objectives into product priorities, defining success measures and using evidence to assess whether changes are delivering the intended results. 

• Collaborative and influential. You'll be comfortable working across cross-functional teams without direct line management authority, providing clear direction and helping stakeholders align around shared outcomes 

• An experienced coach. You'll have experience supporting and developing Business Analysts or similar team members, helping them strengthen their approach to discovery, requirements gathering, analysis and stakeholder engagement. 

• Pragmatic and adaptable. You'll be comfortable navigating complex environments, making informed product-level trade-offs and balancing customer value, operational requirements, technical risk and technical debt. 

It would be great if you also had:  

• Experience working with self-service Touchscreens, Kitchen Display Systems (KDS), POS systems or comparable retail technology. 

• Experience within retail, hospitality, quick-service restaurants or other multi-site operational environments. 

• Experience working with products that combine hardware, software and multiple integration points. 

• Experience supporting products operating across multiple markets or geographies. 

• Familiarity with enterprise architecture, technology governance, security and resilience considerations. 

Please apply directly if you are interested in the opportunity - please note, we cannot provide sponsorship for this role, all applicants must already live and work in the UK for at least the last 5 years with no need of sponsorship.