IT Product Owner

IT Product Owner Consultant – Product & Portfolio Master Data

Duration: 6+ Month Contract

Location: Hybrid in Sandy Springs, GA (30327) or New York, NY (10169) - 2 days onsite

Role Summary

Our client is seeking an experienced IT Product Owner to lead the modernization of their Product Master and Portfolio Master data platforms.

This is a business-facing role for someone who has sat inside an asset manager, wealth manager, or fund administrator — not a vendor building these platforms for clients — and who has owned the end-to-end process of launching new investment products and structuring them into governed master data systems.

They are specifically looking for someone who can speak to real product launches: defining a new fund, strategy, or separate account in the Product Master, building out the sleeve/account hierarchy in the Portfolio Master, and driving that structure through downstream reporting, performance, and IBOR systems.

Key Responsibilities

• Own and prioritize the product backlog for Product Master and Portfolio Master initiatives in an Agile/Scrum environment
• Lead the business-side definition and lifecycle management of new investment products and strategies — from initial product setup through onboarding, restructuring, and eventual termination
• Define and maintain data models for portfolio hierarchies, sleeves, products, accounts, and strategy structures, working from business requirements, not from a vendor/platform-support perspective
• Translate complex business and data requirements into user stories, acceptance criteria, and delivery specs
• Partner with data engineering and architecture teams on database design and integration patterns
• Establish and enforce data governance, ownership, and data quality standards across master data domains
• Own onboarding of new products/portfolios into downstream systems including performance, reporting, IBOR, and vendor platforms (Aladdin, State Street, Bloomberg, FactSet, MSCI)
• Lead UAT, data validation, and reconciliation across systems during product launches and platform changes

Required Experience

• 10+ years in technology, business analysis, or product ownership within an institutional asset manager, wealth manager, or fund administrator (buy-side) — not a fintech vendor, custodian tech team, or bank risk/regulatory function
• 5+ years as a Product Owner by title and function — explicit backlog ownership, user story authorship, and Agile sprint delivery — not a BA or PM who participated in Agile ceremonies
• Direct, hands-on ownership of Product Master and/or Portfolio Master data models from the business side, including at least one instance of launching or restructuring an investment product/strategy end-to-end
• Deep understanding of investment data structures: portfolios, sleeves, accounts, product hierarchies
• Strong knowledge of the front-to-back investment data lifecycle, including IBOR, Security Master, performance, and attribution
• Strong SQL and relational data modeling skills
• Working knowledge of vendor platforms as a client/user (Aladdin, FactSet, Bloomberg, State Street, MSCI, Ridgeline, SimCorp, or similar) — vendor-side employment at these firms is not a substitute for buy-side ownership

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience leading a Product Master or Portfolio Master platform build or migration at an institutional asset manager
• Background in data pipeline design, ingestion frameworks, and transformation processes
• Data governance, stewardship, and enterprise data quality framework experience

Nice to Have

• Experience with AI- or automation-enabled data workflows
• Familiarity with Copilot or similar AI-assisted development tools