Product Manager, Nairobi at Kuunda 3D

THE ROLE IS TO LEAD PRODUCT MANAGEMENT IN AFRICA 

We are looking for an experienced Product Manager based in Nairobi, Kenya. The successful candidate needs to be passionate about building & growing products for the unbanked segment of the population. 

Overview of the role:

• Relationship Management with Partners 
• Product Benchmarks & Research 
• Product Definition of Product Specification with partners 
• Project Management for Product Launch from design to go live  
• Product Growth (design, frameworks, experiments, analysis) to provide the implementation to the teams to implement operationally with oversight from a shared services growth specialist
• Manage daily operations to operate the products 
• Innovation & experimentation

In this role, you will be responsible for:

Identifying product needs: 

• Conduct discussions with partner to understand needs & user’s needs re product specifications
• Conduct market research on existing products within our partners’ eco-system & identify potential gaps

Existing Product launches: 

• Objective: Capacity to deliver & support 6-8 product partners. 
• Product representative: In charge of presenting & representing products to potential partner. Explain different products currently have & detailed rules of how they work
• Market & consumer understanding - Collect qualitative & quantitative data from internal & publicly available external sources to gain market & consumer understanding. Money is incorporated differently within cultures & segments of population, need to understand these differences
• Benchmark other products: Conduct benchmarking of digital & non-digital products, formal & informal products used by potential users & understand which attributes are missing. Benchmark different prices of products
• Understand partners’ ecosystem & priorities: Understand partner’s priorities & define products aligned to priorities. Position product to prioritise within their roadmap. Listen & understand partner’s ecosystem: the payments rails, the stakeholders, the processes, the margins, the incentives, the barriers & pain points, etc. 
• Propose product rules & revise for enhancement: Propose rules which define product & define process for disbursements & repayments. Revise after launch. 
• Understanding underlying risk: Work with scoring team & commercials to explain product & highlight risks & take into account in design, pricing & commercials of product. 
• Propose pricing: Propose pricing range ensuring product is financially sustainable for all parties & ensuring revenue accretive for borrower. Understand economics of user & direct & indirect costs, propose pricing & rules which reduce risks of over-indebtedness
• Support Business Case & Commercials: Collect & input all data required to have holistic view of business case
• Propose UX/UI: Products are fully embedded into partner’s journey, no direct front-end with customer. Understand partner’s UX/UI & propose a user journey for products which will fit into their existing journey
• Document & training: Draft product specifications & documentations relating to product & train internal & external teams  
• Support in defining end-to-end flows: End-to-end flows define how systems integrate. IT team will define flows & need support to explain the product in detail & review flows with partners

Product Growth 

• Objective: Create campaigns to grow active user base & usage of product with ambitious targets
• Growth: Propose variety of tools, campaigns, frameworks & tests to operational team & partners to grow products & whether these tools will be implemented by partner itself or by Kuunda
• Growth Test: Define A/B test on current active base, analyse results & propose ways to grow active user base to increase usage & cross-usage of other products 

Project Management: 

• Manage end-to-end launch of products with support of project managers & other support teams

Operation Management: 

• Ensure daily operations are in place & aligned with operational support teams
• Ensure all processes relating to product are drafted & implemented 

Innovation & experimentation. 

• Testing features: Propose & test new features once product is live
• New concepts: Innovate new product or service concepts useful to users & collaborate on long-term product roadmap. Create high-level business case for new concepts & technical feasibility

WHAT WE ARE LOOKING FOR: 

Experience: 

• A candidate with 5 years plus experience working as a product manager in Banking, MicroFinance and/or Mobile Money
• Relevant degree, or other product management related diploma with relevant industry and business experience 
• Experience of product development in the Kenyan fintech sector essential
• Experience of product development in micro-credit an advantage

Personality: 

• Extrovert: Interact with a lot of external & internal stakeholders & enjoy spending time with them 
• “Doer”: Willingness to roll up one’s sleeves to get the job done 
• Attention to detail: Need to be able to identify relevant details & dismiss irrelevant ones in order to ensure no loophole is created.

Skills: 

• Problem solver: Strong problem-solving skills 
• Listener: Ability to listen to partners & potential users & relate to needs without biases 
• Genuine interest in economics of informal market: Ability to take time to understand the economics
• Quantitative & Qualitative analysis: Ability to analyse & interpret quantitative & qualitative data. 
• UX/UI: Ability to propose UX/UI journeys on Figma or Adobe XD  
• Growth: Ability to understand current growth barriers & propose solutions 
• Cross-function: Proven ability to work with technical team to translate functional requirements into technical requirements. 
• Communication: Excellent written & verbal communication skills  
• Ability to influence: Proven ability to create buy-in for product vision both internally & with key external partners