Product Analyst — Merchant Services (Payments) (contract)

Title: Product Analyst — Merchant Services (Payments) Location: 1525 W W T Harris Blvd Charlotte, NC Alternate Locations: 550 S Tryon St Charlotte, NC or 800 S Jordan Creek Pkwy West Des Moines, IA Duration: 24 months Work Engagement: W2 Work Schedule: 3 days in office/2 days remote Benefits on offer for this contract position: Health Insurance, Life insurance, 401K and Voluntary Benefits Summary: You’ll support the Product Owner by transforming concepts into clear, testable work that keeps delivery moving. Your primary focus is backlog quality, story refinement, and ensuring teams always have two sprints of well‑defined, ready‑to-build work. Responsibilities: Backlog & Story Excellence (Primary Focus) Maintain a high‑quality backlog with two sprints of Definition‑of‑Ready (DoR) items. Break down epics/features into clear user stories with testable acceptance criteria. Lead refinement: expose dependencies, clarify scope, articulate value, and surface risks. Identify unplanned work and propose trade‑offs to protect delivery. Product Analysis Document current state (flows, processes, data). Identify gaps, defects, and practical resolution options. Shape problem statements and solution approaches for PO decisioning. Stakeholder Collaboration Translate business needs into concrete requirements. Work with SMEs to validate use cases and acceptance criteria. Support control/audit requests with clean, traceable documentation. Quality, Testing & Production Readiness Document use cases and scenarios for design and UAT. Partner with UAT leads and perform lightweight testing when required. Represent the team in production triage and lead defect intake/analysis. Sprint Planning & Delivery Rhythm Support Sprint Planning: review outcomes, identify carryover, prepare upcoming work. Surface risks, assumptions, and dependencies; keep PO decisions well documented. Qualifications: Applicants must be authorized to work for ANY employer in the U.S. This position is not eligible for visa sponsorship. Proven experience as a Product Analyst/Business Analyst in Agile delivery (Scrum/SAFe). Strong user story writing, acceptance criteria definition, and refinement facilitation. Ability to turn abstract ideas into clear, testable requirements. Experience in defect/root‑cause analysis with engineering/QA teams. Proficiency with Agile tools (Jira/Azure Boards) and documentation (Confluence, process/data mapping). Financial Services background—especially Payments/Merchant Services (e.g., onboarding, processing flows, chargebacks, settlement, reconciliation). (preferred) Familiarity with controls, audit readiness, and regulated delivery (PCI-DSS a plus). (preferred) Comfort navigating complex stakeholders and clarifying ownership. (preferred) Basic data analysis (SQL or similar). (preferred) Relevant certifications (CSPO/PSPO, SAFe POPM, ICP‑BA, etc.). (preferred)