Senior Associate – Product Owner (Banking & Finance Consulting)
Location: Washington, DC, USA (Hybrid – 3 days/week onsite)
About Cognizant Consulting
Cognizant Consulting is more than Cognizant’s consulting practice—we’re a global community of 5,000+ experts dedicated to helping clients reimagine their business. Blending deep industry expertise with technology advisory, we deliver innovative, scalable solutions for Fortune 500 clients. We are looking for our next colleague to help shape the future of business—could that be you?
About the Role
As a Senior Associate – Product Owner, you will make an impact by owning product strategy, driving Agile delivery, and maximizing business value through effective backlog and stakeholder management. You will serve as the critical bridge between business stakeholders and delivery teams, ensuring solutions are aligned to business goals and deliver measurable outcomes.
You will be part of our consulting delivery team, working closely with clients, cross-functional teams, and leadership to deliver customer-centric digital products at scale.
In this role, you will:
Product Ownership & Strategy (Primary focus)
- Define and drive product vision, roadmap, and strategy aligned to client business objectives
- Own and manage the product backlog, ensuring prioritization aligns with business value
- Lead user story creation, refinement, and acceptance criteria definition
- Make informed prioritization and trade-off decisions to optimize value delivery
- Define and monitor product KPIs and success metrics
Agile Delivery Leadership
- Act as the primary point of contact between stakeholders and development teams
- Lead and actively participate in Agile ceremonies (sprint planning, backlog grooming, demos, retrospectives)
- Ensure continuous alignment between product vision and delivery execution
- Drive incremental value delivery and ensure sprint outcomes meet expectations
Stakeholder Engagement & Consulting
- Build strong relationships with clients, business stakeholders, and leadership teams
- Facilitate product discussions, prioritization workshops, and roadmap alignment sessions
- Act as a trusted advisor, translating business needs into product strategy
- Drive stakeholder alignment and manage expectations across competing priorities
Product Delivery & Value Realization
- Ensure delivered features align with defined business outcomes and acceptance criteria
- Support UAT validation to confirm business requirements are met
- Leverage data insights and performance metrics to guide product decisions
- Continuously identify opportunities for product optimization and improvement
What you must have to be considered
- 6+ years of experience as a Product Owner within consulting or technology environments
- Strong expertise in Agile methodologies (Scrum/Kanban)
- Proven experience owning product backlogs and driving prioritization decisions
- Experience working in client-facing or consulting roles
- Strong ability to drive product strategy and roadmap definition
- Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills
These will help you succeed
- Experience delivering digital transformation or product-led initiatives
- Exposure to data-driven product decision-making
- Familiarity with Agile tools such as JIRA, Confluence, or similar platforms
- Strong consulting mindset with the ability to influence without authority
Work Model (Hybrid)
We believe hybrid work is the way forward as we strive to provide flexibility wherever possible. Based on this role’s business requirements, this is a hybrid position requiring 3 days per week onsite at a Cognizant office in Washington, DC (downtown). We remain committed to supporting work-life balance through our wellbeing programs.
Salary and Other Compensation
The annual salary for this position is expected to be between $85,000 – $101,000 USD, depending on experience and qualifications. This role is also eligible for Cognizant’s discretionary incentive programs and a comprehensive benefits package, including medical, dental, vision, paid time off, and retirement benefits.
Why Cognizant?
- Work on high-impact consulting engagements with leading global clients
- Be part of a collaborative culture built on Work as One, Own It, and Raise the Bar
- Grow your career through continuous learning and development opportunities
- Contribute to innovative, product-led transformation initiatives
Application Details
Applicants must be legally authorized to work in the United States without employer sponsorship.
What we offer
- The chance to work with impact. Here, you’re empowered to bring your biggest thinking to help our company and clients improve everyday life.
- Ownership over your career. Stay at the top of your game through our award-winning learning and development ecosystem. And when your ambitions change or we offer new opportunities, we help you pivot by providing reskilling, on-the-job learning and guidance to find new roles that might be a better fit.
- The opportunity to thrive on a high caliber team with heart. We celebrate each other’s experiences and perspectives and promote a sense of belonging through our affinity groups and diversity and inclusion initiatives.
- A comprehensive total rewards package, including a competitive salary and a pension plan with matching contributions.
- Flexible health and financial benefits to support you and your eligible dependents—from day one.
- True work-life balance. Be at your best through paid time off, flexible work arrangements, volunteering opportunities, social events, and so much more.
About us
Cognizant (Nasdaq: CTSH) is an AI Builder and technology services provider, building the bridge between AI investment and enterprise value by building full-stack AI solutions for our clients. Our deep industry, process and engineering expertise enables us to build an organization’s unique context into technology systems that amplify human potential, realize tangible returns and keep global enterprises ahead in a fast-changing world. See how at www.cognizant.com or @cognizant.
Other employment-related information
Cognizant is an equal opportunity employer. Your application and candidacy will not be considered based on race, color, sex, religion, creed, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, genetic information, pregnancy, veteran status or any other characteristic protected by federal, provincial or local laws.
If you have a disability that requires reasonable accommodation to search for a job opening or submit an application, please email [email protected] with your request and contact information.
Language requirements vary depending on roles, but we ask that all candidates have basic English proficiency for company-wide communications purposes. For roles based in Quebec, professional English proficiency is required, as you’ll deliver services to and collaborate with stakeholders outside the province who may not speak French.
