Sr. Product Owner

What part will you play? If you’re looking for a place where you can make a meaningful difference, you’ve found it.

The work we do at Markel gives people the confidence to move forward and seize opportunities, and you’ll find your fit amongst our global community of optimists and problem-solvers. We’re always pushing each other to go further because we believe that when we realize our potential, we can help others reach theirs. Join us and play your part in something special! We are seeking a Sr. Product Owner to join our ICON/PZAZ/Paragon team. Reporting to the Sr. Director Shared Solutions Product Manager, this role will play a pivotal role in sustaining and modernizing our legacy systems, which remain essential to the stability and success of our business operations. This position is critical to advancing our organizational goals by ensuring these systems continue to deliver reliable performance while evolving to meet future needs. We are seeking a candidate who is not only a strong communicator and strategic thinker, but also an advocate for agile best practices—someone who can bridge technical expertise with collaborative leadership, drive continuous improvement, and help us unlock greater efficiency and innovation across our technology landscape.

Job Location: Hybrid work arrangement based in Richmond, VA or Omaha, NE

Responsibilities:

• Partner with stakeholders, including upstream and downstream systems/functional areas, to understand business priorities and how they rely on legacy applications and workflows.

• Own strategic stakeholder engagement for assigned areas, demonstrating deep knowledge of both business processes and system constraints.

• Adopt and implement agile best practices across the team for maintaining and enhancing legacy systems, balancing stability with incremental improvements.

• Owns prioritization decisions for assigned product backlog and release planning

• Ensure proper documentation of stories and epics that capture business needs.

• Refine and maintain product backlogs, prioritize user stories, and define project scope, objectives, deliverables, and product requirements.

• Work with architects to translate business strategies into practical solutions within the limitations of existing systems while identifying opportunities for modernization.

• Drive delivery of scalable solutions aligned with strategic IT roadmaps strategic IT roadmaps and portfolio budgets

• Collaborate across Operations to ensure legacy systems continue to support these functions without disruption.

• Support User Acceptance Testing (UAT), regression testing, and training initiatives for updates or transitions involving legacy systems.

• Help drive technology and process transformation for US & Bermuda

• Measure product performance and value delivery through KPIs and metrics tied to business outcomes.

• Ensure prioritization aligns with IT investment roadmap and budgetary goals.

• Partner with Product Managers, Architects, and Enterprise teams to maintain conceptual and technical integrity across the portfolio.

• Champion customer-centric outcomes by prioritizing features that enhance customer experience and operational efficiency

• Ensure product changes adhere to regulatory and compliance standards.

• Maintain awareness of emerging technologies and industry best practices to inform product strategy.

Competencies:

• 5+ years of insurance experience is a plus

• Bachelor's degree is required

• Proven experience as a Product Owner or similar role in technology or operations

• Ability to manage multiple and multi-faceted stakeholders

• Solution-oriented, creative thinker

• Strong understanding of Agile methodologies and product management practices

• Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills

• Proficiency in Jira and Confluence for backlog management and documentation.

• Ability to translate strategic goals into actionable business requirements

• Highly ethical, professional, and trustworthy, with a commitment to compliance and integrity

• Flexible, adaptable, and resilient, with the ability to work effectively in a dynamic and changing environment

• Financial and business acumen to align product decisions with organizational goals.

• Ability to track and report on continuous improvement metrics and modernization impact

#LI-Hybrid
#DEIB

US Work Authorization

US Work Authorization required. Markel does not provide visa sponsorship for this position, now or in the future.

Who we are:

Markel Group (NYSE – MKL) a fortune 500 company with over 60 offices in 20+ countries, is a holding company for insurance, reinsurance, specialist advisory and investment operations around the world.

We’re all about people | We win together | We strive for better

We enjoy the everyday | We think further

What’s in it for you:

In keeping with the values of the Markel Style, we strive to support our employees in living their lives to the fullest at home and at work.

• We offer competitive benefit programs that help meet our diverse and changing environment as well as support our employees’ needs at all stages of life.

• All full-time employees have the option to select from multiple health, dental and vision insurance plan options and optional life, disability, and AD&D insurance.

• We also offer a 401(k) with employer match contributions, an Employee Stock Purchase Plan, PTO, corporate holidays and floating holidays, parental leave.

Are you ready to play your part?

Choose ‘Apply Now’ to fill out our short application, so that we can find out more about you.

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Markel is an equal opportunity employer. We do not discriminate or allow discrimination on the basis of any protected characteristic. This includes race; color; sex; religion; creed; national origin or place of birth; ancestry; age; disability; affectional or sexual orientation; gender expression or identity; genetic information, sickle cell trait, or atypical hereditary cellular or blood trait; refusal to submit to genetic tests or make genetic test results available; medical condition; citizenship status; pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions; marital status, civil union status, domestic partnership status, familial status, or family responsibilities; military or veteran status, including unfavorable discharge from military service; personal appearance, height, or weight; matriculation or political affiliation; expunged juvenile records; arrest and court records where prohibited by applicable law; status as a victim of domestic or sexual violence; public assistance status; order of protection status; status as a smoker or nonsmoker; membership or activity in local commissions; the use or nonuse of lawful products off employer premises during non-work hours; declining to attend meetings or participate in communications about religious or political matters; or any other classification protected by applicable law.