Product Owner (EMEA)

<p>As a Product Owner/Business Analyst at Willis Towers Watson, you will be part of a highly collaborative scrum team with members on two continents. This is an integral role in product development by ensuring the organization’s needs are articulated in the user story and acceptance criteria consumed by the Agile Scrum Team. You will be key in influencing prioritization decisions in collaboration with Product Managers and fellow Product Owners, lead discovery activities, and ensure clarity of requirements across the software development lifecycle. </p><p>In this role, you will practice fundamentals of requirements gathering, system conceptual design, and scope definition. Furthermore, you will facilitate discussions with stakeholders, and guide the refinement of business requirements into clear, actionable user stories that drive high-quality feature outcomes. In addition, you may assist in conducting functional and usability testing to ensure that the Agile Scrum Team’s deliverables meet the business requirements and needs. This role works with Willis Towers Watson’s proprietary and/or industry-leading systems and applications and ensures that these are designed and built according to agreed-upon technical specifications and quality standards.</p><p>The ideal candidate is an expert problem solver who can balance strategic thinking with hands-on delivery, while demonstrating strong leadership and technical acuity in a fast-paced, global environment. Communication and collaboration are key in day-to-day support activities for requirements refinement, development, testing, and implementation.</p><p><strong>The Role </strong></p><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><strong>About You:</strong></p><ul style="list-style-type: disc;"><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">You are an experienced <strong>Product Owner/Business Analyst</strong> who can independently perform prioritization decisions, lead requirements discovery, solution definition, and refinement of complex features or epics. </p></li><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">You have strong stakeholder management skills and can confidently communicate and facilitate discussions across varying audiences—product managers, product owners, developers, testers, subject matter experts, and business partners. Furthermore, you demonstrate advanced-level critical thinking, visual modeling, analytical skills, and can guide teams through options, trade-offs, and solution decisions.</p></li><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">You exhibit a strong sense of curiosity and problem solving, contributing to evaluating new tools, technologies, and approaches, and can lead proof-of-concepts that drive continuous improvement within the team, function, or program.</p></li><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">You can mentor and coach less experienced Product Owners/Business Analysts, helping elevate team ways of working, analysis quality, and process consistency.</p></li><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">You are comfortable working remotely across multiple time zones, ensuring clear, proactive communication and timely delivery of commitments.</p></li></ul><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"> </p><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><strong>Key Responsibilities:</strong></p><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><strong>Technical & Product Leadership</strong></p><ul style="list-style-type: disc;"><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">Leads end-to-end discovery and requirements activities for complex features, epics, or cross-team initiatives.</p></li><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">Facilitates Story Mapping, Design Thinking workshops, and other workflow visualization sessions to build shared understanding of problem statements and solution approaches.</p></li><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">Evaluates requirement options and gude teams through decision-making trade-offs based on scope, time, feasibility, and risk.</p></li><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">Defines high-quality user stories, acceptance criteria, and solution options, including the use of templates such as Gherkin Statements where appropriate.</p></li><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">Leads backlog refinement sessions, and support sprint planning, release planning, and stakeholder demo sessions; able to back up the product owner as needed.</p></li><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">Facilitates stakeholder demo sessions and conduct live demonstrations, when appropriate, to showcase team progress and elicit feedback from stakeholders.</p></li><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">Triages bugs and defects encountered during development or production phases, and address any pending concerns.</p></li><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">Ability to review test strategies and collaborate with testers to ensure coverage, clarity, and alignment with business needs.</p></li><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">Analyzes test results, risks, and data to help teams plan effectively and communicate impact to stakeholders.</p></li><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">Drives continuous improvements by identifying enhancements in product processes, team worklows, and SDLC practices.</p></li></ul><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"> </p><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><strong>People Skills & Soft Skills</strong></p><ul style="list-style-type: disc;"><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">Facilitates complex team discussions and help the group arrive at well-informed, consensus-driven decisions.</p></li><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">Mediates and recognizes differences in opinions, guiding teams toward shared understanding and mutually acceptable solutions. Be able to articulate opinions, risks, and concerns in a constructive and emotionally intelligent manner, especially in complex or ambiguous environments.</p></li><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">Communicates clearly across multiple audiences—from technical discussions with dev team members to high-level summaries for leadership and stakeholders.</p></li><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">Mentors and provide guidance to junior and mid-level Product Owner/Business Analysts; collaborates closely with them in sharing good practices on backlog prioritization, user story writing, requirements elicitation and documentation, and communication.</p></li><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">Leads by example through accountability, clarity, and quality of work—helping reinforce strong delivery behaviors within the scrum team.</p></li><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">Leads and facilitates product learning sessions to strengthen product awareness, domain understanding, and shared ownership across all roles in the program.</p></li></ul><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"> </p><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><strong>Strategic Leadership</strong></p><ul style="list-style-type: disc;"><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">Influences product, program, or team backlogs by recommending prioritization decisions based on value, effort, feasibility, and risk. Acts as leader within the team, ensuring that requirements, solution decisions, and delivery activities support on-time and high-quality product outcomes.</p></li><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">Demonstrates strong process disicipline while also knowing when and how to challenge existing norms constructively</p></li><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">Evaluates emerging technologies, tools, industry practices, and provide recommendations for adoption when beneficial</p></li><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">Leads or contributes to internal proof-of-concepts, share results with the team, and advocate for improvements to processes, tools, or delivery approaches.</p></li><li><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;">Takes on special initiatives or projects that contribute to the growth of the function or program</p></li></ul>

Back to blog

Common Interview Questions And Answers

1. HOW DO YOU PLAN YOUR DAY?

This is what this question poses: When do you focus and start working seriously? What are the hours you work optimally? Are you a night owl? A morning bird? Remote teams can be made up of people working on different shifts and around the world, so you won't necessarily be stuck in the 9-5 schedule if it's not for you...

2. HOW DO YOU USE THE DIFFERENT COMMUNICATION TOOLS IN DIFFERENT SITUATIONS?

When you're working on a remote team, there's no way to chat in the hallway between meetings or catch up on the latest project during an office carpool. Therefore, virtual communication will be absolutely essential to get your work done...

3. WHAT IS "WORKING REMOTE" REALLY FOR YOU?

Many people want to work remotely because of the flexibility it allows. You can work anywhere and at any time of the day...

4. WHAT DO YOU NEED IN YOUR PHYSICAL WORKSPACE TO SUCCEED IN YOUR WORK?

With this question, companies are looking to see what equipment they may need to provide you with and to verify how aware you are of what remote working could mean for you physically and logistically...

5. HOW DO YOU PROCESS INFORMATION?

Several years ago, I was working in a team to plan a big event. My supervisor made us all work as a team before the big day. One of our activities has been to find out how each of us processes information...

6. HOW DO YOU MANAGE THE CALENDAR AND THE PROGRAM? WHICH APPLICATIONS / SYSTEM DO YOU USE?

Or you may receive even more specific questions, such as: What's on your calendar? Do you plan blocks of time to do certain types of work? Do you have an open calendar that everyone can see?...

7. HOW DO YOU ORGANIZE FILES, LINKS, AND TABS ON YOUR COMPUTER?

Just like your schedule, how you track files and other information is very important. After all, everything is digital!...

8. HOW TO PRIORITIZE WORK?

The day I watched Marie Forleo's film separating the important from the urgent, my life changed. Not all remote jobs start fast, but most of them are...

9. HOW DO YOU PREPARE FOR A MEETING AND PREPARE A MEETING? WHAT DO YOU SEE HAPPENING DURING THE MEETING?

Just as communication is essential when working remotely, so is organization. Because you won't have those opportunities in the elevator or a casual conversation in the lunchroom, you should take advantage of the little time you have in a video or phone conference...

10. HOW DO YOU USE TECHNOLOGY ON A DAILY BASIS, IN YOUR WORK AND FOR YOUR PLEASURE?

This is a great question because it shows your comfort level with technology, which is very important for a remote worker because you will be working with technology over time...