Data Product Manager (Contractor) MNSITE-3838

Company Description

Big challenges need bold thinkers.

If you’re someone who sees problems as opportunities, you’ll thrive here. RESPEC is 100% employee-owned, which means we take ownership of every challenge. Here, your ideas drive real solutions. Since 1969, we’ve tackled complex challenges in energy transition, infrastructure resilience, digital transformation, and sustainability.

At RESPEC, you’ll work alongside clients to take on critical problems. Depending on your expertise, you might design infrastructure in remote locations, develop renewable energy solutions for global projects, or apply data-driven technology to improve mining and water systems.

We bring deep technical knowledge, real-world experience, and a commitment to work that matters. If you're looking for a place where your contributions have real impact, you’ll fit right in.

We do not accept unsolicited resumes from third-party recruiters.

Job Description

RESPEC is seeking an experienced, strategic Data Product Manager to champion a major state enterprise modernization initiative supporting the Minnesota Department of Information Technology Services (MNIT) and the Department of Children, Youth, and Families (DCYF). In this role, you will lead the evolution of core human services data into scalable, secure, and governed data products that power the "Whole Family" approach.

You will act as the key bridge between executive stakeholders, data engineering, data science, and operational teams, driving the transition from legacy mainframe platforms to cutting-edge cloud data lakes and modern curation architectures. Your leadership will directly impact public health and human services delivery by turning raw enterprise data into trusted, consumable assets for decision-makers and frontline personnel.

Core Responsibilities

As a Data Product Manager at RESPEC, you will guide data products through their complete lifecycle—from initial ideation and architecture alignment to deployment, user adoption, and ongoing optimization:

• Product Strategy & Roadmap: Partner with Enterprise Architecture, technical leads, and agency leadership to define the product vision, prioritize backlogs, and link data capabilities directly to state business outcomes.
• Modernization & Lifecycle Delivery: Spearhead the migration of data pipelines from legacy mainframe environments to modern lakehouse platforms, ensuring robust data lineage, metadata cataloging, and automated data quality frameworks.
• Cross-Functional Collaboration: Partner directly with data engineering and data science teams to build scalable pipelines, analytical models, and reusable data services in Databricks and modern cloud tools.
• Stakeholder Enablement & Analytics: Collaborate with analytics teams to implement interactive dashboards and KPI frameworks in Tableau, Power BI, and Looker while establishing metrics that quantify data product adoption and impact.
• Governance & Ethical Data Use: Champion robust data privacy, governance, and ethical AI standards within a regulated human services framework, ensuring strict alignment with state and federal compliance policies.
• Knowledge Transfer & Mentorship: Lead structured knowledge transfer sessions and documentation to ensure internal teams maintain long-term operational excellence.

Qualifications

Required Technical Experience

To be successful in this role, candidates must demonstrate the following foundational qualifications:

• 4+ Years of Professional Data Experience: Proven background in data management, data engineering, data analytics, or technical product management.
• Data Systems & Modeling: Strong hands-on understanding of relational and non-relational database systems, SQL, ETL/ELT pipelines, data warehousing, and modern data lakehouse architectures.
• Product Leadership: Demonstrated experience managing digital or data products through the full development lifecycle, translating ambiguous business requirements into clear technical specifications and user stories.
• Stakeholder Management: Excellent verbal and written communication skills with a proven ability to translate complex technical concepts into business-friendly terms for executive leadership.

Preferred Qualifications

• Databricks Expertise: Extensive hands-on experience designing or managing workflows within the Databricks platform.
• Modern Analytics & Transformation Stack: Working familiarity with dbt as well as visualization tools such as Tableau, Power BI, Looker, or Google Analytics.
• Programming Literacy: Fundamental understanding of Python and/or Java for data processing and platform development.
• Public Sector / Regulated Industries: Prior experience working with large public sector agencies, healthcare, human services, or other highly regulated environments managing enterprise data sharing agreements and statistical reporting.
• Internal Platform Development: Proven success building developer-facing data products or enterprise data meshes.

Additional Information

Work Model

• Model: Remote or Hybrid. Candidates must be available during regular business hours of 7:00 AM – 6:00 PM Central Time, Monday through Friday.
• Client Office Location: Department of Children, Youth, and Families (DCYF), 444 Lafayette Rd N, St. Paul, MN 55155.
• Geographic Requirement: All candidates must be physically located within the United States.

All your information will be kept confidential according to EEO guidelines.

All your information will be kept confidential according to EEO guidelines.