• Seeking an Associate Director, Product & Platform Strategy to help translate strategic business priorities into coordinated product, platform, data, and technology plans.
• This role will partner across business, product, technology, data, architecture, and delivery teams to frame complex opportunities, facilitate the evaluation of potential approaches, assess cross-functional impacts, and build alignment around a recommended path forward. The individual will connect related development efforts and translate the agreed direction into high level sequenced delivery plans that clarify required capabilities, dependencies, decision points, ownership, and timing.
• The successful candidate will combine strong product or platform strategy experience with practical program planning capabilities. This individual may lead program execution for select initiatives, but the primary responsibility is to create the strategic clarity, cross-functional alignment, and executable plan needed to enable successful delivery.
• This role does not own detailed requirements, technical architecture, solution design, product backlogs, or the day-to-day delivery of individual product teams. Instead, it brings together the appropriate experts and accountable teams to evaluate options, understand impacts, make informed recommendations, and coordinate the transition into delivery.

Key Responsibilities:

1. Product and Platform Strategy:
   • Partner with business and technology stakeholders to understand strategic priorities, business opportunities, challenges, and desired outcomes.
   • Translate complex or ambiguous needs into clearly framed opportunities and capability considerations.
   • Develop a holistic view of the products, platforms, data assets, and technology capabilities relevant to an opportunity.
   • Facilitate evaluation of how existing and planned capabilities could be leveraged to address business needs.
   • Identify capability gaps, overlaps, dependencies, and opportunities for reuse across products and platforms.
   • Help ensure proposed approaches align with broader product, platform, data, and technology strategies.
   • Develop strategic recommendations and decision materials informed by input from accountable subject-matter experts.
2. Solution Evaluation and Impact Assessment:
   • Bring together Product Management, Architecture, Data, Engineering, Operations, and other subject-matter experts to explore potential solution approaches.
   • Structure and facilitate the evaluation of options based on expected value, strategic alignment, feasibility, complexity, scalability, reuse, dependencies, and delivery implications.
   • Coordinate cross-functional impact assessments across products, platforms, data, integrations, processes, stakeholder groups, and delivery teams.
   • Ensure the appropriate experts identify the capabilities, investments, decisions, and dependencies required to advance an initiative.
   • Synthesize expert input into a cohesive view of potential approaches, trade-offs, risks, and downstream impacts.
   • Surface cross-functional considerations that may not be visible within individual product or delivery teams.
   • Ensure detailed requirements, technical design, architecture decisions, and backlog ownership remain with the appropriate accountable teams.
3. Delivery Strategy and Sequencing:
   • Translate an agreed strategic direction into a sequenced and actionable delivery plan.
   • Work with accountable product and delivery leaders to define major capabilities, workstreams, dependencies, milestones, decision points, and expected outcomes.
   • Facilitate alignment on ownership and clarify how work will progress across participating teams.
   • Develop sequencing recommendations that consider business urgency, technical dependencies, capacity, readiness, and opportunities for incremental value delivery.
   • Identify critical-path activities, cross-team dependencies, and decisions that could affect execution.
   • Support the transition from strategy and planning into delivery by ensuring teams share a common understanding of objectives, sequencing, and accountabilities.
   • Adapt plans as new information, delivery constraints, or strategic priorities emerge.
4. Strategic Integration:
   • Maintain visibility across related development efforts and help ensure they advance as part of a coherent product and platform direction.
   • Connect initiatives across organizational boundaries to identify dependencies, duplication, gaps, and opportunities for alignment.
   • Convene the appropriate business, product, architecture, data, technology, and delivery stakeholders to address cross-functional questions.
   • Help leadership understand how individual initiatives contribute to broader business outcomes and platform capabilities.
   • Partner with portfolio and product leaders to connect strategic priorities, investment decisions, and delivery plans.
   • Promote scalable and reusable approaches where appropriate while recognizing when business needs require differentiated solutions.
5. Program Planning and Potential Execution Support:
   • Establish fit-for-purpose planning, governance, and reporting structures for assigned initiatives.
   • Maintain an integrated view of major milestones, dependencies, risks, assumptions, decisions, and accountable owners.
   • Prepare initiatives for execution by ensuring that the agreed approach, delivery sequence, ownership model, and key dependencies are clear.
   • Support the designated program or delivery lead during transition and execution, as appropriate.
   • Lead program coordination for select initiatives when organizational needs or the delivery model require it.
   • When serving as program lead, coordinate cross-functional execution, monitor progress, manage dependencies, and escalate risks and decisions requiring leadership attention.

Location: East Hanover, NJ (3 Days onsite and 2 days remote).