Lead Product Owner

Job Title: Lead Product Owner 

Division: Data, Technology and Innovation 

Department: Digital Systems 

• Salary: National (Edinburgh and Leeds) ranging from £72,100 to £103,000 and London from £79,300 to £113,000 per annum (salary offered will be based on skills and experience) 

• This role is graded as: Technical Specialist – Regulatory  

• Your external recruitment contact is Benjamin via [email protected].  

• Your internal recruitment contact is Lauren via [email protected] 

• Applications must be submitted through our online portal. Applications sent via social media or email will not be accepted. 

About the FCA and team  

We regulate financial services firms in the UK, to keep financial markets fair, thriving and effective. By joining us, you’ll play a key part in protecting consumers, driving economic growth, and shaping the future of UK finance services.  

The Data, Technology and Innovation (DTI) division enables the FCA to be a digital-first, data-led smart regulator by delivering a secure, agile, and cost-effective technology and data ecosystem that drives better decisions, transparency, and operational efficiency. 

Sitting within DTI, the Digital Systems team delivers the systems that enable the FCA to be a more effective and smarter regulator. 

Role responsibilities 

• Deliver change and operational services through development, maintenance, and operations partners on a complex product, enabling end-to-end ownership and stability while giving you the opportunity to work on systems with real scale and visibility  

• Estimate resources, costs, and timelines for product change and shaping prioritisation across the portfolio with senior stakeholders, ensuring informed decision-making and offering you direct influence over strategic investment and delivery outcomes  

• Deliver technical and service solutions that meet agreed acceptance and definition of ready criteria through agile and DevSecOps practices, resulting in faster, more secure, and higher-quality delivery while deepening your experience in modern engineering approaches  

• Forecast and tracking product-level costs aligned to sponsoring divisions and projects, contributing to budget and recharge processes to support financial transparency and giving you exposure to commercial ownership beyond delivery execution  

• Set, monitor and track performance against key performance indicators to provide clear insight into product health and delivery effectiveness, enabling you to demonstrate measurable impact and continuous improvement  

• Ensure compliance with governance requirements while refining and clarifying stakeholder requirements for development teams, balancing regulatory rigour with delivery pace and allowing you to operate as a trusted bridge between business and technology 

Skills required  

Minimum: 

• Demonstrated experience heading teams of staff and external partners accountable for a complex product throughout the full lifecycle of IT change and operational delivery  

• Extensive service management knowledge, including incident and problem management, across a diverse and complex business environment  

• Solid planning and delivery capability, with significant experience estimating resource, cost, and time requirements, as well as executing capacity (resource and technology), availability and release planning to deliver and run product change effectively 

Essential: 

• Experience of software application/infrastructure life-cycle management, and the activities involved in application/infrastructure development/change 

• Knowledge of and exposure to agile development practices 

• Commercially aware, with the ability to understand supplier proposals and promote cost-effective solutions 

• Solid technical and architectural knowledge across relevant environments platforms software industry and business practices with the ability to solve complex problems make final decisions restore functionality and deliver effective outcomes  

• Credible and steady leader with experience negotiating with executives and clearly communicating explicit and implicit enterprise trade-offs, building relationships across the organisation and coaching peers and specialist teams in product management methodologies  

• Strategic yet pragmatic thinker who motivates and leads innovation internally and externally providing industry-relevant thought leadership while constructively challenging established approaches and focusing on the bigger picture 

Benefits 

• 28 days annual leave plus bank holidays 

• Hybrid model where employees work a minimum of 40% in the office each month (expectation of 50% for senior leaders). Changing from September to a minimum of 50% in the office each month (expectation of 60% for Directors and Executive Directors) 

• Non-contributory pension (8–12% depending on age) and life assurance at eight times your salary 

• Private healthcare with Bupa, income protection, and 24/7 Employee Assistance 

• 35 hours of paid volunteering annually 

• A flexible benefits scheme designed around your lifestyle 

For a full list of our benefits, and our recruitment process as a whole visit our benefits page. 

Our values & culture  

Our colleagues are the key to our success as a regulator. We are committed to fostering a diverse and inclusive culture: one that’s free from discrimination and bias, celebrates difference, and supports colleagues to deliver at their best. We believe that our differences and similarities enable us to be a better organisation – one that makes better decisions, drives innovation, and delivers better regulation. 

If you require any adjustments due to a disability or condition, your recruiter is here to help - reach out for tailored support. 

We welcome diverse working styles and aim to find flexible solutions that suit both the role and individual needs, including options like part-time and job sharing where applicable. 

Disability Confident: our hiring approach  

We’re proud to be a Disability Confident Employer, and therefore, people or individuals with disabilities and long-term conditions who best meet the minimum criteria for a role will go through to the next stage of the recruitment process. In cases of high application volumes, we may progress applicants whose experience most closely matches the role’s key requirements. 

Useful information and timeline 

• Advert Closing: 25/05/26 

• CV Review/Shortlist:  26/05/26 

• First Stage telephone Interviews W/C: 03/06/26 

• Second Stage technical interview: w/c 08/06/26 & 15/06/26 

• Your Recruiter will discuss the process in detail with you during screening for the role, therefore, please make them aware if you are going to be unavailable for any date during this time.