Akhil S

About Akhil S

Product problems are usually people problems in disguise. That\'s the lens I bring as a Product Owner.Over 5 years, I\'ve learned that the best user stories come from actually sitting in the room with stakeholders — asking the questions no one else is asking, mapping the pain behind the request, and then turning that clarity into sprint-ready work that engineering can run with.At Lumen Technologies, I own the Acqueon Dialer platform — driving campaign strategy, compliance configuration, and backlog delivery across Marketing, Call Center Ops, Sales, and IT. At Verizon before that, I led enterprise platform initiatives connecting contact center, payment, and reconciliation systems.I\'m equally comfortable in a whiteboard discovery session, a sprint retrospective, or a SQL editor validating that the data actually says what the dashboard claims it does.Currently exploring: senior PO roles where product, data, and customer experience intersect. s••••••••@gmail.com

Experience

1. Product Owner

   Lumen Technologies

   Apr 2024 — Present · US

   Collected, analyzed, and documented product requirements from internal business stakeholders across multiple functional teams. • Facilitated requirement-gathering workshops to align business needs with product capabilities and technical feasibility. • Coordinated the creation of product mockups, wireframes, and prototypes to support internal feature requests. • Collaborated closely with UX/UI designers to validate user experience flows and design assumptions. • Authored and presented detailed feature specifications to Engineering teams for implementation. • Oversaw, reviewed, and formally signed off on functional specifications prior to development. • Guided cross-functional Agile teams of developers, QA, and designers toward the successful delivery of product features. • Actively participated in Scrum ceremonies including daily stand-ups, sprint planning, sprint reviews, and retrospectives. • Led and contributed to backlog grooming sessions, breaking down epics into well-defined and estimable PBIs. • Presented sprint priorities, clarified requirements, and answered developer questions during sprint execution. • Partnered with Scrum Masters and Engineering leads to help mitigate impediments impacting sprint and release goals. • Maintained regular communication with stakeholders to provide visibility into feature progress, risks, and timelines. • Coordinated end-to-end testing efforts, including system testing, user acceptance testing (UAT), and release sign-off. • Collected, triaged, prioritized, and tracked bug fixes to ensure product stability and quality. • Developed detailed requirement specifications including business logic, workflows, and UI behavior.

Education

• University of North Texas

  Master's degree, Data Analytics

• Vignan Institute of Technology and Science

  Bachelor of Technology - BTech, Electrical and Electronics Engineering