Cordance is dedicated to accelerating the growth of vertically focused business-to-business (B2B) software-as-a-service (SaaS) companies through acquisition and long-term tactical and financial guidance. We’re experienced operators and subject-matter experts with a passion for software and building businesses. We partner with founders to help them scale their businesses and realize their companies’ full potential.
We look for businesses with strong leadership and high potential for profitable growth, and work together to increase year-over-year revenue, company efficiency, and impact. Cordance envisions that all companies we work with achieve their full potential. We embrace what makes each company great and build on those foundations. We believe in elevating a company as it scales, delivering dignity to the organization and its employees, and sharing a passion for building a legacy.
Overview of the Position
The Product Owner will translate approved product priorities into clear, delivery-ready work for Cordance Commerce engineering teams. This person will own backlog quality, refinement, user stories, acceptance criteria, requirement clarification, dependencies, and release readiness to ensure Engineering understands what they are building, why it matters, and what successful delivery looks like.
The Product Owner will work closely with the Product Manager, Engineering, Design, Quality Assurance, Architecture, Customer Success, Support, Sales, and other business partners. The Product Manager owns product vision, strategy, roadmap priorities, and outcome decisions, while the Product Owner turns those priorities into executable work and supports the team through delivery.
Core Responsibilities
- Own and maintain a clear, prioritized, and delivery-ready product backlog for assigned Commerce products or value streams.
- Translate approved roadmap priorities and business outcomes into epics, features, user stories, acceptance criteria, and supporting documentation.
- Partner with the Product Manager to ensure backlog priorities reflect customer value, revenue, growth, retention, risk, strategic opportunities, and technical dependencies.
- Lead regular backlog refinement and ensure upcoming work meets the team's Definition of Ready before sprint planning.
- Participate actively in sprint planning, reviews, retrospectives, release planning, and other Agile ceremonies.
- Clarify requirements throughout delivery and document decisions, assumptions, scope changes, and acceptance expectations.
- Accept or reject completed work against agreed acceptance criteria and coordinate business validation when necessary.
- Manage functional dependencies and sequencing across Product, Engineering, Design, QA, Architecture, Operations, and customer-facing teams.
- Support release readiness by confirming scope, acceptance, documentation, stakeholder communication, training needs, dependencies, and outstanding risks.
- Partner with Customer Success, Support, Sales, Implementation, and customers to clarify needs and incorporate validated feedback into the backlog.
- Provide clear delivery updates covering backlog health, readiness, risks, dependencies, decisions, release scope, and planned-versus-delivered work.
- Maintain accurate and current backlog and delivery information within Jira and related collaboration tools.
- Help continuously improve product-delivery practices without introducing unnecessary process.
Competencies
- Backlog Leadership: Maintains a healthy, prioritized backlog with sufficient detail and delivery-ready work for upcoming sprints.
- Requirement Clarity: Translates business and customer needs into understandable stories and testable acceptance criteria.
- Customer & Business Focus: Connects delivery work to customer value, revenue, growth, retention, operational improvements, and strategic outcomes.
- Delivery Partnership: Works closely with Product, Engineering, Design, and QA to resolve ambiguity and keep work moving.
- Prioritization & Judgment: Makes practical tradeoffs based on value, urgency, risk, dependencies, effort, and available capacity.
- Communication & Influence: Communicates effectively with technical and non-technical stakeholders and drives decisions without relying on formal authority.
- Data-Informed Improvement: Uses product and delivery data to improve backlog quality, predictability, adoption, and outcomes.
- Accountability: Maintains clear ownership, decisions, deadlines, and follow-through throughout the delivery lifecycle.
Required Experience
- 5+ years of experience in Product Ownership, Product Management, Business Analysis, or a similar software-delivery role.
- At least 3 years of experience working directly with Agile or Scrum software engineering teams.
- Demonstrated experience owning and refining product backlogs and writing epics, user stories, and clear acceptance criteria.
- Strong understanding of the software development lifecycle, including testing, release planning, and production readiness.
- Experience prioritizing work based on customer value, business impact, risk, technical dependencies, and delivery capacity.
- Hands-on experience with Jira or a comparable Agile work-management platform.
- Strong facilitation, organization, analytical thinking, written communication, stakeholder management, and conflict-resolution skills.
- Ability to work effectively during North American business hours with distributed teams and stakeholders.
- Bachelor's degree in Business, Computer Science, Engineering, Information Systems, a related field, or equivalent practical experience.
Preferred Experience
- CSPO, PSPO, or comparable Product Owner certification.
- Experience with commerce, retail, point-of-sale, marketplace, inventory, order management, payments, donation, thrift/resale, or similar transactional software.
- Experience working within a multi-product B2B SaaS portfolio or acquisition-led organization.
- Familiarity with prioritization frameworks such as RICE, WSJF, MoSCoW, or similar methodologies.
- Experience with Confluence, Miro, Figma, Lucidchart, Power BI, or comparable documentation, design, and reporting tools.
- Experience supporting cloud migrations, platform modernization, product integrations, data initiatives, or customer migrations.
- Experience using customer feedback, product analytics, support data, and adoption data to inform backlog decisions.
- Comfort working with APIs, integrations, data flows, and technical dependencies.
Success Measurements
Backlog Health & Readiness
- Maintains a prioritized backlog with sufficient delivery-ready work for upcoming sprints.
- Improves the clarity and testability of requirements and acceptance criteria.
- Reduces defects and rework by ensuring completed work meets clear acceptance criteria before release.
Delivery Predictability
- Improves alignment between roadmap priorities, sprint commitments, and delivered outcomes.
- Reduces avoidable carryover, requirement-related delays, and rework.
Stakeholder Alignment
- Ensures Product, Engineering, and business stakeholders share a clear understanding of priorities, scope, decisions, and tradeoffs.
- Provides timely visibility into risks, dependencies, changes, and release readiness.
Customer & Business Outcomes
- Maintains traceability between delivered work and expected customer or business outcomes.
- Uses customer feedback and outcome data to recommend backlog adjustments to the Product Manager.
Please note that we do not accept unsolicited resumes, work on a Corp-to-Corp basis, or engage with non-vetted external agencies.
Why Join Us?
At Cordance, we believe in taking care of our team members. When you join us, you’ll enjoy a comprehensive benefits package designed to support your health, financial well-being, and work-life balance:
- Health and Wellness:
- Comprehensive Health Coverage: Coverage begins on your first day of employment.
- Retirement Savings:
- 401K Plan (US): We match 1:1 for the first 3% of contributions and 0.5:1 for the next 2%. Contribute 5% of your salary and get a 4% match. Choose from pre-tax and Roth options. You’re eligible the first of the month after 90 days and immediately vested.
- RRSP (CAN): We match 1:1 for the first 3% of contributions and 0.5:1 for the next 2%. Contribute 5% of your salary and get a 4% match. Choose from pre-tax and Roth options. You’re eligible the first of the month after 90 days and immediately vested.
- Paid Time Off:
- Flexible PTO: Enjoy uncapped paid time off to balance your work and personal life.
- Parental Leave:
- 12 weeks paid leave for all employees.
- Remote Work Support:
- Monthly Stipend: Receive $75 USD / $140 CAD per month for phone and internet if you work remotely.
- Holidays:
- Generous Holiday Schedule: Benefit from an extensive list of holidays to recharge and spend time with loved ones.
Join us and be part of a company that values your contributions and well-being from day one!
EEOC & ADA Statement:
Cordance and its companies provide equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type without regard to race, color, religion, age, creed, sex, nationality, ancestry, national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, affectional or sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, marital status, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state, or local laws.
Cordance and its companies comply with federal and state disability laws and make reasonable accommodations for applicants and employees with disabilities. If reasonable accommodation is needed to participate in the job application or interview process, to perform essential job functions, and/or to receive other benefits and privileges of employment, please contact Human Resources.
This applies to all terms and conditions of employment, including recruiting, hiring, placement, promotion, termination, layoff, recall, transfer, leaves of absence, compensation, and training.
Final candidate must be able to pass a background check.
To view applicant notices required under federal and state law, please visit: https://cordance.co/applicant-notices/
