Financial times

Product Manager - 12 month FTC

London Full Time
About Us

The Financial Times is one of the world’s leading news organisations, globally recognised for its authority, integrity and accuracy, with a mission to deliver quality information and services worldwide.

At the FT, curiosity thrives and ambitious thinking is rewarded. Together, we help audiences stay better informed and deepen their understanding of the world around them.

Our Product & Tech teams drive us forward in an ever-evolving digital landscape, delivering cutting-edge products to over one million digital subscribers daily. Our growth relies on a diverse, dedicated and dynamic group of product, tech, delivery and data specialists.

With a supportive culture, entrepreneurial spirit and opportunities at every turn, there are no limits to where your FT career can take you. Build a newsworthy career at the FT.

Our commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion

We believe in the power of unique perspectives and want all voices in our organisation to be heard, respected and valued. A supportive workplace is one where employees feel they can be themselves and operate to their full potential. We are committed to removing barriers for everyone, with a focus on addressing those faced by underrepresented groups.

The Role Overview

As Product Manager for the Newsroom, you’ll shape and deliver a key part of our product strategy. You’ll be the voice of our users, building deep insight into how journalists and teams work, then turning that into clear product opportunities that improve outcomes for the business.

You will be responsible for explaining the why of a multidisciplinary team, setting tangible goals, then guiding them through the daily priorities to achieve them. You’ll be able to find the right balance of long and short term objectives and be able to use qualitative & quantitative data to measure, learn and pivot as needed.

You will form a partnership with the senior stakeholders in your immediate business area to understand their needs and to make them aware of how they can leverage new features and technical developments in your domain. You will do this in collaboration with the other disciplines in your team (engineering, UX, delivery etc).

You will also communicate with a wider department and company about the work your team is doing, helping gain support for your vision and telling a story about your progress.

The Editorial Technology team recently completed a major project building a new content management system and now aims to deliver the tools to take FT journalism to the next level. The challenge ahead for this role lies in leveraging this system to provide value to the wider FT business with our FT Specialist publishers, as well as championing further development in several key areas of newsroom interest. 

To be successful in this role you will ...

  • Be able to analyse data to draw insights and use this to prioritise work.
  • Have excellent written and oral communication skills, a natural evangelist for the products you are working on.
  • Be confident in leading teams and stakeholders by influence. 
  • Have knowledge of the entire product lifecycle from insights, to roadmap development, blending user experience and data-driven approaches.
  • Have a strong personal interest in the news media, relishing the chance to help build the future of one of the great global brands in media. 

As Product Manager for editorial products, you’ll work closely with the Newsroom to build an unrivalled and essential experience for our audiences, powered by editorial tooling.

Example things you will work on:
  • Tools to create rich multi-modal content – and its presentation to our audience;
  • Data tools to inform editorial decision-making – from curation to content strategy;
  • Intelligent, comprehensible AI tools to support high-quality writing, like fact-checking and others;
  • Investigate new content distribution channels enabled by new technologies.

This role is an equal partner with editors, solving problems together. It will require strong skills in strategic thinking, focus and prioritisation, and communication. Diplomacy is key. 

We are looking for a strategic thinker capable of building strong relationships to deeply understand the problems the newsroom is trying to solve and get things done. You are skilled at turning complex problems into clear delivery plans and executing with pace. 

Internal Products

The role you are applying for is in Internal Products, which is split into three main teams:-

  • Editorial: This team has built a suite of modern applications for our Editorial staff to write, edit, and publish thousands of news stories, videos, and podcasts every week. The tools help our 600 journalists collaborate across the world and visualise the performance of everything we publish.
  • Marketing: This team are responsible for ensuring our Marketing teams across the FT have a data platform full of rich customer information as well creating marketing automation tools that use that data to help personalise our communications with each subscriber.CRM: The team looks after the products and technology that support our B2B and other commercial sales teams, currently being given a complete end-to-end overhaul. The systems enable 450 people across the FT to be able to collaborate on all aspects of the sales process, understand their customers (past, present, and future) across the entire lifecycle.
  • CRM: The team looks after the products and technology that support our B2B and other commercial sales teams, currently being given a complete end-to-end overhaul. The systems enable 450 people across the FT to be able to collaborate on all aspects of the sales process, understand their customers (past, present, and future) across the entire lifecycle.

What’s in it for you? Our benefits

Our benefits vary by location but we are committed to providing best-in-class perks across all our offices. These include generous annual leave, medical cover, inclusive parental leave packages, subsidised gym memberships and opportunities to give back to the community. Full details of our benefits are available here.

We’ve embraced a 50% hybrid working model (averaging two to three days onsite) that fosters trust and remote adaptability while encouraging in-person camaraderie and peer learning. Additionally, we are open to accommodating specific flexible working pattern requests for all roles where feasible.

Accessibility

We are a disability confident employer and Valuable 500 signatory.

Please let us know if you require any reasonable adjustments/personalisation as part of the application process or to enable you to attend an interview. If you would like to discuss your requirements or have any questions, email talent@ft.com and a member of our team will be happy to help.

Further information

At the FT, we embrace innovation and the use of technology and appreciate that individuals may leverage AI tools as part of their job application process. Whilst we are happy for you to use AI to assist with your application, it is essential that all information provided is authentic and accurately represents your skills, experience, and qualifications.

Candidates should be aware that the use of AI throughout the application process may be monitored to ensure a fair and transparent hiring process for all.