Product Owner: Offboarding & Exits (Employee Lifecycle)
Who are we?
At Pearson, we’re committed to a world that’s always learning and to our talented team who makes it all possible. From bringing lectures vividly to life to turning textbooks into laptop lessons, we are always re-examining the way people learn best, whether it’s one child in our own backyard or an education community across the globe. We are bold thinkers and standout innovators who motivate each other to explore new frontiers in an environment that supports and inspires us to always be better. By pushing the boundaries of technology — and each other to surpass these boundaries — we create seeds of learning that become the catalyst for the world’s innovations, personal and global, large and small.
What you’ll do
As our HR Product Owner for Offboarding & Exits, you will be the strategic and operational lead responsible for shaping how we support employees and HR teams through resignation, retirement, redundancies, and restructures.
In this role, you will serve as the global expert responsible for optimizing systems, processes, policies, and the overall employee experience for Offboarding & Exits. You’ll be both a visionary and a hands-on driver, introducing innovative capabilities to simplify offboarding, enhance compliance, and remove barriers to productivity.
Your primary focus will be to ensure a seamless, consumer-grade experience for employees during Offboarding & Exits, consistently applied across our diverse geographies. Acting as the technical superuser for all things related to offboarding, you’ll translate Pearson’s people strategy into practical, impactful solutions that balance global standards with local needs.
You’ll act as the bridge between the Employee Relations Centre of Excellence, HR Business Partners, and the Care teams (Country Care and People Care), ensuring alignment and collaboration across all Offboarding & Exits processes, whether supporting business-as-usual terminations or large-scale restructurings.
This role is ideal for an HR professional with strong digital experience, or a product/process expert with hands-on HR lifecycle knowledge, particularly in managing complex offboarding and sensitive transitions at scale. You will play a pivotal role in making Offboarding & Exits at Pearson not only consistent and compliant, but also thoughtful, scalable, and efficient. Your duties will include:
Requirement Gathering and Analysis
Work closely with Employee Relations, HRBP, and the Care teams to gather requirements for termination processes. Translate business requirements into global and local initiatives within the Offboarding & Exits area, providing impact assessments, identifying areas for improvement, providing configuration support and resolving related escalations or defects. Analyze and prioritize these requirements to ensure alignment with business and compliance goals. System Configuration (Low to No Code) Take ownership of basic system configurations in Oracle Fusion, focusing on Offboarding & Exits-related processes as the designated Offboarding & Exits’ technical superuser. Partner with HR Solutions team members to cross train on your specialty area as well as engage in the Oracle Product roadmaps. Drive adoption and oversee change management for Offboarding & Exits-related Fusion updates, collaborating closely with relevant stakeholders to ensure successful implementation.Process Architecture
Develop and document comprehensive process maps for Employee Relations and HR operations. Lead process modelling activities, including mapping "as-is" and "to-be" states, analysing information flows, controls, and system architecture using industry-standard tools. Facilitate the definition of the skills required for the delivery teams to perform their roles effectively.Backlog Management
Maintain and prioritize the Offboarding & Exits process support backlog, ensuring it reflects current needs and priorities. Define clear and actionable user stories and acceptance criteria.Stakeholder Communication
Serve as the primary point of contact between the Employee Relations team, HR Solutions, and operational HR teams. Communicate the vision, goals, and progress of termination processes to stakeholders and team members. Facilitate regular updates and feedback sessions with stakeholders.Vendor management approach
Help shape a clear vendor management approach for outplacement Support the Employee Relations with the centralization of support from fewer firm globally Help us chaise cost efficiency in that space at Enterprise level. Compliance and Continuous Improvement Stay updated with trends and best practices in employee termination and restructuring. Propose and implement innovative solutions to improve termination processes and employee experience.Who you will work with
You’ll work on a team of HR Product Owners and report to the HR Product and Process Manager. Your team is part of the Digital Experience team, reporting into the HR Operations organization. Your global remit will give you a chance to work with our Country Care local HR operatives, who jointly support HR services in more than 60 countries.
Who you are
Obsessed with employee experience Promoter of agile programs of work and deliverables Wired for stakeholder engagement – capable of driving consensus and, when appropriate, holding firm to overriding principles Capable and willing to respectfully and firmly challenge the status quo (“we ask why”) Technically savvy: able to learn and operate in complex global software systems Pays close attention to detail while able to understand and apply over-arching initiative goals to decision making Compliance-minded while managing the complexity of a global operation Balanced HR perspective – understanding and advocating the importance of Learning and its context within the broader HR remit. Student of simplification and making complex processes appear simple to the end user Proven ability to be hands-on while working with stakeholders in a matrixed environment. Agile and effective change manager Flexible to support projects in different time zones