Product Owner in Cookstown

Are you the kind of Product Owner who wants to get close to the actual problem you're solving, not just take requirements and pass them down the line? We're working with an established, fast-growing software business in Cookstown. Every product hire they've made to date has learned the role from the inside - this will be the first time they bring in someone who's already done the job elsewhere. (Growing at around 60% year on year, and still fully independently owned.) It's a step up from how the function has been resourced before, but it's not a heavily strategic, removed-from-the-detail kind of product role either. You'll sit close to engineering, close to the customer, and close to how the product actually behaves.

What you'll be doing:

• Translating customer and business requirements into clear specs, user stories and documentation
• Working closely with the Customer Success and Implementation teams to understand priorities and give realistic delivery timelines
• Prioritising what gets built next based on customer value, technical feasibility and strategic impact
• Defining acceptance criteria and checking delivered work against spec
• Communicating and escalating clearly - if something's needed for a go-live, you're the one making sure it doesn't quietly slip
• Helping bring more structure to the function as the team grows

This is an enterprise platform, not a consumer app, so it's about solving a genuine operational problem properly, not chasing a flashy front end.

What they're looking for:

• Experience already in a Product Owner / Product Manager role - or a strong Business Analyst wanting to step into product ownership
• Comfortable working hands-on with a development team: specs, user stories, user guides, documentation
• Strong analytical mindset - able to get into the detail of a problem, not just describe it at a high level

Advantageous, not essential:

• Experience with system integrations (e-commerce platforms or ERP systems)
• Working knowledge of SQL / databases
• Background in logistics, supply chain or similar

The kind of person who'll do well here:

• You'd rather understand how something actually works than just write a ticket and move on
• You can communicate clearly enough to make sure the right things get prioritised, not just the loudest things
• You're not precious about coming from a 'proper' product background if you've done the job well as a BA

Why this is worth a look:

Most product roles are either heavily strategic and removed from the detail, or junior and purely execution-focused. This is neither. You'd be joining a five-person product team at a company growing fast and still independently owned, with real autonomy and room to shape how the function works as it scales. If you want a role where you can actually get close to the product rather than just manage someone else's backlog from a distance, this is worth a conversation.