Purpose of the job:
As the Crypto Product Innovation Lead at VALR, a critical aspect of your role involves a deep understanding of the competitive landscape and a keen insight into user needs within the cryptocurrency ecosystem. It is essential for you to be continuously immersed in the latest market trends, competitor strategies, and consumer feedback, ensuring that our product offerings are competitive and finely tuned to the evolving demands of our users. Your role encompasses the full spectrum of product development, from setting priorities and inspiring the leadership team to collaborating closely with engineers to craft products that align with both the company's strategic objectives and our customers' expectations. This comprehensive approach involves staying ahead of industry developments and trends, positioning us to proactively innovate and uphold our market leadership. Your strategic insight and forward-looking mindset are crucial in uncovering growth opportunities and ensuring our products deeply resonate with our audience, thereby delivering value and fostering user engagement.
What will you be doing:
- Analyse the Competitive Landscape: Continuously monitor and evaluate market trends, competitor strategies, and customer feedback to ensure our products are competitive and meet user needs.
- Understand User Needs: Develop a deep understanding of user behavior, preferences, and feedback to guide the development of user-centric products.
- Stay Ahead of Trends: Keep up-to-date with the latest developments in the cryptocurrency space to anticipate shifts in technology and user expectations.
- Deepen Knowledge in DeFi and Blockchain: Dive into the intricacies of Decentralized Finance (DeFi) and blockchain technology, understanding their impact on the crypto ecosystem and how they can be leveraged in new product development.
- Set Strategic Priorities: Define and prioritize product development initiatives to align with the company's long-term objectives.
- Inspire Leadership: Work closely with the leadership team to set a clear vision for product development and motivate the team towards achieving these goals.
- Collaborate with Technical Teams: Foster a collaborative environment with engineering teams to ensure the successful execution of the product roadmap, from conception to launch.
- Align Products with Strategic Objectives: Ensure that all product initiatives are in harmony with the company’s strategic goals and customer expectations.
- Drive Product Innovation: Identify opportunities for innovation within the product lineup, ensuring that VALR remains a leader in cryptocurrency solutions.
- Create and Articulate a Vision: Develop and communicate a compelling vision for new products and features, inspiring stakeholders across the company.
- Own the Product Development Process: Manage the product development lifecycle from conception through launch, working iteratively with the engineering team to refine and perfect each product.
- Communicate with all levels of staff: Effectively convey product visions and strategies to staff at all levels, including executive stakeholders, ensuring alignment and support across the company.
- Collaborate Cross-functionally: Work closely with engineering, design, and business teams to develop and guide product roadmaps that meet market needs and strategic goals.
- Conduct In-depth Research: Undertake comprehensive research on markets, customers, competition, business strategies, and products to inform decision-making.
- Write Product Specifications: Craft detailed product specifications, manage product backlogs, and prioritize new features based on strategic importance and customer value.
- Identify and Resolve Inefficiencies: Seek out inefficiencies in product management tools, processes, and workflows, and implement solutions to enhance productivity and product quality.
- Collaborate on Technical Decisions: Work alongside the engineering team to understand technical constraints and make informed decisions on trade-offs.
- Conduct Product Demos: Showcase new and upcoming product capabilities to stakeholders and gather feedback to inform future development.
- Run User Acceptance Testing: Lead user acceptance testing efforts and provide final sign-off on products, ensuring they meet business requirements and user expectations.
What we look for in you:
- Strong understanding of blockchain technology, cryptocurrency markets, and decentralized finance (DeFi) products and protocols. Actively engaged in the crypto community and proficient in trading, staking, and utilising DeFi platforms.
- Experience working with Layer 1 & Layer 2 blockchain protocols
- Ability to understand & articulate and document complex nuances of various crypto protocol
- Fully up-to-date on the current trends & developments in blockchain & crypto wallets space
- Proven experience as a Crypto Product Innovation Lead in the cryptocurrency industry.
- Strong ability to articulate a clear vision and strategy for product development.
- Excellent communication skills, with the ability to engage with stakeholders at all levels.
- Expertise in managing product backlogs, writing specifications, and prioritizing features.
- Exceptional research skills and the ability to gather insights quickly.
- Cross-functional collaboration skills with engineering, design, and business teams.
- Problem-solving mindset and the ability to make informed trade-off decisions.
- A proactive approach to identifying and resolving inefficiencies in processes.
What can you expect from VALR:
- Competitive salary: Get paid well to work in an exciting industry.
- Leave: Compliance with statutory leave required by individual countries, in addition to flexible leave.
- Remote work: Work from wherever you like - Employees to ensure that there is secure, stable internet connectivity to effectively work remotely.
- Home office setup: Mac laptop and a discretionary allowance to buy all the extras needed to work happily from home - all of it yours to keep after 3 years. Terms and Conditions will apply.
- Learning fund: An annual upskilling budget of R16,000 per employee, which will be converted to the respective currency of the employee's payment, in addition to scheduled VALR training.
- Performance bonus: When you contribute to VALR’s success, you’ll be rewarded with discretionary bonuses.
- Regular get-togethers outside of work.
- Annual company retreats.
