Hackajob is collaborating with Sainsbury's DTD to connect them with exceptional professionals for this role.
We’d all like amazing work to do, and real work‑life balance. That’s waiting for you at Sainsbury’s. Think about the scale it takes to feed the nation – the level of data, transactions and variety involved. Then you’ll realise this is a modern software engineering environment, because it has to be. We’ve made significant investment in the standards and principles that shape how we work. We iterate, learn, experiment and champion ways of working such as Agile, Scrum and XP. So you can look forward to exciting opportunities across everything from AI to reusable tech.
Please note - This is a 12 month FTC position
In a nutshell
In Sainsbury’s Tech, we power the UK’s number 1 multi‑channel, multi‑brand retailer. Our product teams are made up of inspired and multidiscipline individuals who are empowered to solve hard problems in ways our customers love and serve the needs of our business.
The Head of Product (HoP) is a critical leadership role. Relentlessly focused on understanding, anticipating and exceeding customer needs, the HoP creates, drives and champions the long‑term vision for their product domain to achieve our overarching business strategy. This product leader is a customer‑centric motivator who inspires and coaches, while guiding the organisation in the pursuit of value growth.
The HoP defines and drives the use of product metrics to effectively prioritise within their organisation and product domain, and uses a data mindset to coach, challenge and guide their team and stakeholders to make data‑driven decisions. Displaying a strong understanding of the commercial drivers that determine the viability and longevity of a product while considering the market context and clear definition of the business benefit of products.
The role holder engages in technical discussions, asks questions and challenges their teams to enable the creation of better technology solutions, utilising a variety of techniques to develop a broad understanding of the tech landscape and customer expectations of technology.
What I Need To Do
* Lead our product management practice, developing product teams who deliver the vision of their products, and achieve our strategic business goals.
* Bring together and present multiple product visions within their domain into a single coherent overview.
* Ensure teams are leveraging common thinking and technologies.
* Set and define outcomes and metrics for their principal areas.
* Spot opportunities in the market within their domain.
* Align product visions to end‑to‑end propositions/brands.
* Refine and optimise within defined capital and request support on priority or capacity contention.
* Work across divisions to shape dependent roadmaps and features, escalating where prioritisation trade‑offs are needed across teams.
* Build strong relationships up to DD level to engage on the visions/roadmaps for their principal product areas.
* Lead and coach a team of senior product managers directly within your domain.
* Contribute and coach better product across the division using product competency and internal frameworks.
* Take the lead to trial and embed new practices, principles and tools.
* Be accountable for nurturing talent in the team and foster a learning culture and high trust.
* Maintain and develop third‑party supplier relationships, supporting opportunity progress.
Specifically Focusing On
* Leading the Cloud, Hosting and Connectivity Product Domain, accountable for defining and delivering these capabilities as platforms‑as‑a‑product, with clear value propositions, outcomes, roadmaps and measures of success.
* Building and evolving shared platform products that underpin Sainsbury’s digital estate, enabling product and engineering teams to deliver value faster through secure, reliable, scalable and cost‑effective infrastructure, connectivity and cloud services.
* Championing a cloud‑first approach, driving cloud migration and adoption across the organisation, and shaping product‑led roadmaps for hybrid and multi‑cloud platforms, ensuring teams can consume cloud services in a consistent, well‑governed and self‑service manner.
* Owning the product strategy for hosting, cloud and enterprise connectivity, including network and connectivity services, ensuring these platforms are designed for resilience, performance, security and operational excellence at scale.
* Working closely with Engineering, Architecture, Security and Service teams to evolve platform capabilities, renew foundational technologies, introduce new platform services and decommission legacy infrastructure, balancing innovation with stability, risk and cost efficiency.
* Embedding platform‑as‑a‑product principles, including strong customer understanding (internal users), clear service definitions, effective product metrics, and continuous improvement based on usage, performance and feedback.
* Being the champion for the product area, determining the right level or type of information to communicate the experience, benefits and long‑term vision across a variety of audiences including development teams, stakeholders at all levels, partners and external parties.
* Being the arbitration and escalation point for prioritisation and trade‑offs within their product area to deliver maximum value and return on capital.
* Maintaining awareness, interest and understanding of existing and future end‑to‑end technology stacks/interfaces, and coaching others to develop technologies that work seamlessly for customers and colleagues.
* Ensuring the team maintains a realistic 90‑day roadmap, as well as a prioritised and estimated full‑year backlog, regularly communicating progress and proactively managing risks/issues to remove blockers.
* Supporting communication and resolution of live product incidents and effectively prioritising, coordinating and communicating the resolution of production issues.
* Maintaining a highly collaborative relationship with engineering, support at all levels to understand and solve problems for our customers and the business.
* Collaborating with the Head of Product, and other Principal Product Managers across the business to ensure consistency, drive overall strategic business outcomes/shared objectives, and continuously improve product management across the division.
* Developing a strong team of product managers, building the competency and enhancing the craft within the community – fostering a culture of learning, empowerment, experimentation and collaboration.
* Driving the team and their products toward the future organisation aspirations, through constructive challenge and thought leadership, fostering a culture where our customer ambition inspires the team to aim high and deliver at pace.
* Contributing and leading within the Product Community of practice.
How I Will Succeed
What I Need to Know
* Knowledge and understanding of a retail business and the technology landscape, and how to maximise the value that products can add.
* Understanding of Agile delivery and modern engineering team practices.
* Knowledge of technical product development principles and methodologies.
What I Need To Show
* Commercial acumen, including understanding of the commercial drivers that determine viability and longevity of a product, ROI assessment and market context consideration.
* Customer focus, with a relentless focus on understanding, anticipating and exceeding customer needs and collaborating effectively with stakeholders.
* Data‑driven mindset, including a drive for the use of product metrics to prioritise a roadmap effectively and the ability to use data and insights appropriately while mitigating interpretation risks.
* Product process expertise, adapting behaviour across all stages of the product lifecycle, deep understanding of delivery approaches, prioritisation of outcomes over outputs, and continuous improvement of ways of working.
* Strategic vision, creating, driving and championing long‑term product vision aligned with business strategy and anticipating cross‑team implications.
* Technical curiosity, engaging in technical discussions and challenging teams, using a range of techniques to understand the tech landscape and customer expectations.
* Creative problem solving, enthusiasm for delivering change through both people and technology.
* Ability to shift between strategic visioning and detailed execution, acting as authority in all aspects of the product area.
* Positive impact on internal and external audiences, with excellent stakeholder management skills and senior stakeholder advocacy for your product families.
* Demonstrable experience of leading and developing teams, both directly and cross‑functionally.
* Strong communication and influencing skills across the organisation at all levels.
* Success in delivering for multiple product teams across different stages of the customer journey.
Resources Available To Me
* Team of up to 15 Product Managers (C4 & C5 grades).
* £5m‑£20m capex budget.
* Product community of practice.
* Large team of dedicated and matrixed resources.
* Learning and development within Sainsbury’s.
* Internal product expertise and co‑learning opportunities within a highly collaborative environment.
Company Commitment
We are committed to making Tech a place where people love to work and diverse, engaged teams make a purposeful contribution. Sainsbury’s is committed to being the most inclusive retailer, and flexible working including job sharing is welcomed wherever possible.
Benefits
* Colleague discount across our multi‑brands – Sainsbury’s, Argos and Habitat.
* Holiday allowance.
* Bonus scheme.
* Pension plan.
* Special offers on gym memberships, restaurants, holidays, retail vouchers and more.
Work‑Life Balance
Work‑life balance is important to us, so we offer our colleagues as much flexibility as possible in line with the needs of their role. We trust them to decide how, where and when they work, combining remote and collaborative working with a flexible approach to hours, giving them plenty of time and space for life outside of work while delivering against our business goals.
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