Portfolio Director - Residential

PRIMARY FUNCTION:

Accountable for developing and deploying a comprehensive product vision and strategy to ensure the financial health and viability within the business. Responsible for product segments representing significant revenue and/or complexity (product families, channels, etc ) to A.O. Smith.

SPECIFIC DUTIES/ACCOUNTABILITIES

Product lifecycle from conception to end of life

• Using the AOSNPD process, ensure new products are launched on-time and meet market and cost requirements by managing the abnormal and driving the organization to make the critical decisions on-time.
• Identify sustaining product activities to be completed to ensure business needs are met.

Product Strategy

• Responsible for the creation and maintenance of assigned segment strategies.
• Responsible for developing 3-year product plans for the assigned product lines. The plans are to be updated no less than annually or as market conditions require.
• Drive alignment on product strategies and roadmaps with the business leadership team to ensure appropriate support from all business functions as part of the product planning and development activities.

Product Management

• Direct, Manage and Develop Product Management resources to support the needs of the product strategy and development activities.
• Represents customer needs and deliver products that best meet market needs.
• Conduct market research and competitive analysis to identify new product opportunities and ensure current product lines are competitive.

Risk Management

• Identify potential risks, assess their impact, and develop risk mitigation strategies.
• Ensure compliance with regulations and industry standards.
• Implement planning and actions to minimize risks.

Leadership

• Timely decision-making skills
• Guide individuals and teams to make sound decisions.
• Make sound decisions and communicate effectively how and why a decision was made
• Comfortable functioning with a high degree of ambiguity
• Delegates work to lowest and appropriate level in the organization

Lead by influence to coordinate cross-functional product activities to drive profitable growth

• Ensuring health and financial viability by monitoring P&L and identify opportunities to optimize financial performance.
• Develop, execute, and maintain a communication strategy to ensure that all relevant departments have timely and accurate product information to perform their roles in the organization.

• Manage relationships and agreements with third party vendors who supply re-sell products to the business.

• Provide teams with a sense of urgency to ensure tasks and projects are completed to meet timelines.

BASIC QUALIFICIATIONS:

• Bachelor's degree from four-year college or university in Business or Technical Field with minimum of 7 years of related experience in Product Development and/or Product Management.
• MBA strongly preferred.
• Applicable water related industry knowledge and the experience of the certification process to bring products to market is strongly preferred.
• Outstanding all around communication skills including verbal, written, and technical to effectively communicate with internal and external stakeholders.
• Ability to understand and articulate financial implications of product line decisions.

• Demonstrated ability to build and maintain positive relationships at all levels of the organization and within customer value chain.
• Strategic thinker, passionate and driven to succeed.
• Demonstrates motivation and potential to move into higher leadership roles.