[Hiring] Product Owner @Kuali

Role Description

We’re looking for a Product Owner – Academic Operations to drive the vision, prioritization, and delivery of Kuali’s academic operations solutions.

As Product Owner, you’ll translate institutional needs into actionable product requirements, ensuring our software empowers universities to streamline curriculum, scheduling, and academic workflows.

You’ll collaborate closely with Product Managers, Designers, and Engineers to deliver high-impact features that improve operational efficiency and student outcomes.

Responsibilities

• Own the product backlog for Kuali Research, ensuring clarity, prioritization, and alignment with strategic goals.
• Translate customer feedback, institutional requirements, and product vision into actionable user stories and acceptance criteria.
• Collaborate daily with engineering and design teams to ensure timely, high-quality delivery.
• Partner with Product Managers to refine roadmap priorities and validate outcomes against customer needs.
• Support release planning, sprint reviews, and retrospectives to drive continuous improvement.
• Serve as the voice of the customer within the scrum team, ensuring solutions meet real-world research administration challenges.
• Monitor product performance and collaborate on data-driven decisions to enhance usability and adoption.

Qualifications

• Curious, enthusiastic, and empathetic individuals who solve problems and advocate for the customer.
• Experience with both Java and Node.js/React.
• Versatile developers comfortable in both greenfield and refactoring projects.
• Experience in owning, prioritizing, and refining the Academic Operations product backlog.
• Ability to lead solution discovery and collaborate with engineering on delivery.
• Strong understanding of Academic Operations users, institutional workflows, requirements, and higher education practices.
• Experience in translating customer feedback, user research, product data, and institutional requirements into clear user stories.
• Ability to represent customer and user needs throughout the development process.
• Experience in managing tradeoffs among customer value, scope, quality, timing, technical constraints, and long-term product health.
• Experience in validating completed work through acceptance testing and stakeholder feedback.
• Experience in partnering with Sales, Marketing, Customer Success, and other teams for successful product launches.
• Ability to monitor adoption, usability, quality, and operational performance following release.
• Experience in communicating product progress, decisions, dependencies, risks, and outcomes clearly.
• Experience using AI to improve backlog management and product delivery.
• Contribution to the continuous improvement of product development practices.

Requirements

• 5+ years of experience in product ownership or business analysis within SaaS or enterprise software.
• Strong understanding of higher education operations—curriculum, scheduling, or student systems.
• Skilled in agile methodologies and backlog management.
• Excellent communication and stakeholder engagement skills.
• Analytical mindset with a focus on outcomes and user experience.
• Passion for improving education through technology.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with academic ERP or SIS integrations.
• Familiarity with product analytics and data-driven decision-making.
• Background in higher education administration or edtech product development.
• A collaborative, curious, and mission-driven mindset.

Benefits

• Remote-first work.
• Top-of-the-line equipment of your choice to get your job done.
• A truly exceptional benefits package including full premium coverage for employee and dependent medical and dental care.
• 401(k) matching.
• Employee stock option plan.
• Paid Maternity/Parental leave.
• All the paid time off you need (just work it out with your manager).
• Encouragement and support in learning and improving your skill-sets.
• Space to work on self-driven projects during quarterly “hack weeks.”
• Employee resource groups and community events.