Job Description

Job Description

This job description for an Identity and Access Management (IAM) Product Owner outlines the key responsibilities, qualifications, and core competencies necessary for the role.

The successful candidate will drive the vision, strategy, and roadmap for the IAM product suite, ensuring it meets business needs for security and compliance.

Job Title: Product Owner, Identity and Access Management (IAM)

Department: Information Security, Identity and Access Management

Job Summary:

The IAM Product Owner is a key member of multiple Agile teams responsible for leading the strategic direction and lifecycle management of the organization's IAM platforms.

This role serves as the voice of the customer and stakeholders, bridging business needs and technical requirements to deliver secure, user-friendly, and compliant identity solutions.

The Product Owner will own and prioritize the IAM product backlog, collaborate with cross-functional teams, and evangelize the IAM vision across the enterprise.

Essential duties and responsibilities:

Product strategy and roadmap

• Define and maintain the IAM product vision, strategy, and roadmap in alignment with enterprise security and business goals.
• Serve as the primary liaison between business stakeholders, technical teams, and vendor partners for all IAM initiatives.
• Drive IAM transformation and maturity by leading the transition from legacy systems to modern, automated solutions.
• Identify opportunities for innovation and improvement by analyzing IAM landscape trends, competitive offerings, and customer feedback.

Backlog management and prioritization

• Own, define, and prioritize the IAM product backlog based on strategic goals, risk reduction, and business value.
• Write clear, concise, and actionable user stories with acceptance criteria to guide the development team.
• Make informed decisions and trade-offs on feature prioritization to maximize the value delivered by each release.
• Ensure the product backlog is visible, transparent, and understood by all stakeholders.

Agile team collaboration

• Act as the primary point of contact for the development team, answering questions and providing clarity on requirements throughout the sprint cycle.
• Participate in all Agile/Scrum ceremonies, including sprint planning, daily scrums, sprint reviews, retrospectives and PI Planning.
• Collaborate with engineers, architects, and QA to refine the backlog, ensuring items are ready for development.
• Review and accept completed work from the development team to ensure it meets the defined acceptance criteria and product vision.

Stakeholder communication and engagement

• Communicate the IAM product vision, strategies, and progress to various audiences, including executive leadership and end-users.
• Gather feedback from stakeholders, including security, HR, and IT operations, to continuously refine product requirements.
• Manage stakeholder expectations and negotiate priorities to ensure alignment across competing demands.

Risk, security, and compliance

• Familiar with SOX & NERC-CIP compliance requirements, or has experience in heavily regulated spaces requiring strict IT controls for manage access and infrastructure.
• Ensure the product adheres to relevant security best practices and compliance frameworks (e.g., SOX , NERC CIP).
• Serve as a subject matter expert on IAM processes and technologies, including identity lifecycle management, privileged access management (PAM), and modern authentication solutions.
• Support access certification campaigns, entitlement reviews, and audit readiness activities.
• Collaborate with security teams on risk assessments and reporting related to identity access.

Qualifications

Required skills and experience:

• Education: Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, or a related technical field is preferred.
• Experience: 5+ years of experience in Identity and Access Management (IAM), with a minimum of 2 years in a product owner or related role.
• IAM Expertise: Strong understanding of IAM concepts and technologies, including Single Sign-On (SSO), Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA), user provisioning, and directory services (e.g., Active Directory, Azure AD, Okta, SailPointIIQ/ IdentityNow/ SecurityCloud).
• Agile Methodologies: Extensive experience working in an Agile environment (Scrum, Kanban), including managing product backlogs and writing user stories.
• Leadership: Demonstrated ability to lead and influence cross-functional teams without direct authority.
• Communication: Excellent communication and interpersonal skills, with the ability to articulate complex technical material to both technical and non-technical audiences.
• Problem-Solving: Proven ability to analyze complex problems and identify innovative, data-driven solutions.

Attributes:

• Strong customer-centric and security-first mindset.
• Collaborative and diplomatic team player.
• Strategic and visionary thinker.
• Ownership mentality with a drive for execution.

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