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Premera Blue Cross

Health benefits plans and related services

Agile Product Owner 3

Full-Time
$111.9k - $190.2k+ 401(k) employer match
Senior
Bachelor's
Mountlake Terrace, WA, USA
HybridHybrid role located on the Mountlake Terrace campus; on-campus attendance is required, but the number of days is unspecified.
ProductProduct Management

About the job

Requirements
  • A bachelor's degree in Information Systems, Computer Science, Business, or a related field, or an equivalent combination of education and experience.
  • Five years of experience in product ownership, product management, business systems analysis, systems analysis, business analysis, or related Agile delivery roles.
  • Ability to prioritize work based on business value, strategic alignment, and customer impact while delivering measurable results.
  • Ability to deliver results with accountability and ownership within a collaborative Agile team environment.
  • Strong understanding of business and product strategies within assigned domains and ability to communicate them to technical and business audiences.
  • Ability to build and maintain trusted partnerships with business and technology stakeholders.
  • Ability to define, coordinate, and lead user acceptance testing activities.
  • Experience defining requirements for moderately complex products, systems, and business processes.
  • Working knowledge of analytical tools, relational databases, and software applications.
  • Ability to analyze moderately complex business problems and data sets.
  • Ability to communicate verbally and in writing to technical and non-technical audiences.
  • Ability to make sound decisions using analysis, judgment, experience, and business insight.
  • Problem-solving and root-cause analysis skills, with a proactive approach to preventing issues and resolving challenges.
  • Ability to facilitate medium- to large-scale meetings and workshops using a variety of facilitation techniques.
  • Ability to work in ambiguous or evolving situations and help teams clarify requirements and priorities.
  • Ability to reinforce a positive Agile team culture and address obstacles affecting team effectiveness.
  • Ability to identify opportunities for innovation, efficiency, and continuous improvement.
Responsibilities
  • Represent the customer within the Agile team and ensure business priorities and customer needs are understood.
  • Develop an understanding of business and product strategies and communicate them to Agile teams and stakeholders.
  • Facilitate relationships with business partners, vendors, and user communities, incorporating their perspectives into product planning and delivery.
  • Act as a liaison among business stakeholders, vendors, and technology teams for new product implementations and enhancements.
  • Use data, metrics, and customer insights to inform product strategy and prioritization decisions.
  • Own, maintain, prioritize, refine, and optimize the product backlog with stakeholders and engineering teams.
  • Lead backlog refinement sessions to identify scope, dependencies, risks, and priorities.
  • Define, document, and refine business requirements through epics, features, user stories, and acceptance criteria.
  • Prioritize work based on business value, customer impact, strategic alignment, dependencies, and delivery timelines.
  • Collaborate with Agile teams throughout solution design, development, testing, and release activities.
  • Coordinate with other Product Owners to align priorities, dependencies, and roadmap objectives.
  • Partner with business and technology leaders to develop measurable outcomes and define business value.
  • Facilitate product demonstrations and release reviews and take accountability for stakeholder feedback and outcomes.
  • Communicate release content, product value, priorities, and roadmap progress to business partners and leadership.
  • Build and maintain trusted relationships with stakeholders across business and technology organizations.
  • Coordinate and support user acceptance testing activities.
  • Review, approve, and accept completed user stories, enablers, and technical debt backlog items.
  • Ensure quality expectations are incorporated into requirements and delivery outcomes.
  • Identify opportunities to improve processes, product delivery, quality standards, and operational efficiency.
  • Assess product opportunities and risks using key performance indicators and other performance metrics.
  • Mentor and support less experienced team members.
  • Perform other duties as assigned.
Desired Qualifications
  • Experience working in a software development environment using Agile delivery practices, including Scrum and SAFe.
  • Experience translating business needs into features, user stories, and acceptance criteria.
  • Experience using SQL or other data analysis tools to support product decisions.
  • Knowledge of healthcare or health insurance operations.
  • Experience with product development and collaboration tools such as Azure DevOps, Confluence, Product Plan, and Visual Studio.

About the company

Premera Blue Cross is a regional health plan based in Mountlake Terrace, Washington, serving more than 2.8 million people in Alaska and Washington. It provides comprehensive health benefits and a wide range of related services, including health, life, vision, dental, stop-loss, disability, and workforce wellness offerings. Its products are delivered through employer groups, individuals, and other customers, with a focus on tailored services, quality outcomes, and cost control to make healthcare work better for customers. Premera differentiates itself by operating as an Independent Licensee of the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association in its Pacific Northwest footprint, offering a broad benefits portfolio and services such as language assistance and accessible support to meet civil rights and customer needs. The company’s goal is to improve customers’ lives by making healthcare easier to access, understand, and manage, while maintaining affordable, quality care.

Company Size

1,001-5,000

Company Stage

N/A

Total Funding

N/A

Headquarters

Mountlake Terrace, Washington

Founded

1933

Get referred to Premera Blue Cross

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Simplify Jobs

Simplify's Take

What believers are saying

  • Matchmaker drove 63% appointment scheduling among members using the service in 2025.
  • Premera expanded cancer case management on January 6, 2026 for self-funded plans.
  • Premera and MultiCare reached an agreement in principle on July 28, 2026.

What critics are saying

  • Premera could lose Alaska Regional Hospital on October 1, 2026, disrupting Alaska access.
  • MultiCare negotiations in 2026 showed persistent reimbursement conflict and member-recall risk.
  • ERISA and antitrust cases keep Premera exposed to benefits litigation and discovery costs.

What makes Premera Blue Cross unique

  • Premera’s Matchmaker matched 2,700 members in 2024, up from 800 in 2023.
  • Premera won a 2026 North Star Award for ALICE and CLARA AI tools.
  • Premera’s 2027 individual-market transition standardizes tools across its payer workflows.

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Benefits

Health Insurance

Dental Insurance

Vision Insurance

Life Insurance

Disability Insurance

401(k) Company Match

Wellness Program

Unlimited Paid Time Off

Paid Vacation

Tuition Reimbursement

Commuter Benefits

Hybrid Work Options

Company News

The Benefits Academy
Sep 14th, 2026
2027 Individual plans.

2027 Individual plans. Washington's 2027 individual market will bring rate increases, carrier exits and expansions, and changing county coverage. Review the key developments - including how Silver loading may make some Gold plans less expensive than Silver after subsidies - and why shopping across carriers and metal levels will be essential. The Washington State Office of the Insurance Commissioner (OIC) released approved 2027 rates for 12 of the 13 individual carriers who will offer options in Washington state in 2027. The Benefits Academy is still waiting to see the final approval for Asuris NW, and Providence Health Plan will no longer be offering coverage as of January 1st. While requested increases ranged from 8.6% to 27.8%, the final approvals fall between 6.8% and 30.5%. This article provides an overview of the 2027 individual market. To review its 2027 Individual Rate Tracking spreadsheet, County coverage table, Second-Lowest Cost Silver Plan comparison, and Plan Subsidy Analysis, log in (account license required) HERE and scroll down to the Broker Resource Library. Carriers Approved Of the 12 individual carriers that have been approved, all but one will have a double-digit increase. Regence BlueShield, offered in 18 of the 39 Washington counties, is the only carrier offering a single-digit increase at 6.8%. BridgeSpan, Kaiser NW, Kaiser WA, Regence BCBS, and Wellpoint renewals are in the 10% to 20% increase range. Those with increases over 20% include Community Health Plan of Washington, Coordinated Care, LifeWise, Molina, Premera, and UnitedHealthcare. Changes to County Coverage In 2027, The Benefits Academy will see one carrier exit the individual market in Washington (Providence), which currently serves Benton, Clark, Franklin, Spokane, Thurston, and Walla Walla counties. This will affect roughly 300 current customers. Options will remain for these individuals: Benton County will have 8 carriers offering benefit plans, Clark County will have 6, Franklin County 7, Spokane County 9, Thurston County 9, and Walla Walla County 8. Two carriers, Coordinated Care/Ambetter and LifeWise, will be eliminating coverage in some counties. Coordinated Care/Ambetter is eliminating five counties (Adams, Chelan, Douglas, Kittitas, and Okanogan). LifeWise is more concerning because it is removing its plans from King County. Three other carriers will be expanding their county lists. Community Health Plan of Washington will be adding San Juan County, Wellpoint will be adding Snohomish and Thurston counties, and Premera Blue Cross will be adding a whopping 15 counties (Adams, Asotin, Benton, Columbia, Ferry, Garfield, Grant, Kittitas, Lewis, Pend Oreille, San Juan, Snohomish, Stevens, Walla Walla, and Whitman). County Offerings All counties continue to have at least 3 carriers offering individual medical coverage as The Benefits Academy head into 2027. King, Pierce, Snohomish, Spokane, and Thurston counties will continue to have the most carriers available, with 9 each. Comparing 2027 to Past Years For the third consecutive year, at least one Washington individual carrier has received an average rate increase exceeding 20%. When comparing each carrier's 2027 average rates to its 2024 average rates, the cumulative increases are striking. Six carriers have experienced increases of more than 50% over just three years: * 112% United Healthcare * 74% Coordinated Care/Ambetter * 73% Community Health Plan of Washington * 70% Regence BlueShield of Oregon (serving Clark County) * 69% Molina * 63% Premera Blue Cross UnitedHealthcare stands out, with its average individual rates more than doubling over the three-year period. Silver Loading For 2026, Washington required a uniform cost-sharing reduction (CSR) silver-load adjustment on Silver qualified health plans sold through the Exchange. This increased Silver premiums relative to other metal levels and, in turn, increased the Federal Advance Premium Tax Credit (APTC) available to eligible enrollees as the enhanced COVID-era subsidies expired. Because APTC is based on the second-lowest-cost Silver plan SLCSP but can be applied to other Exchange plans, the result can make Gold coverage surprisingly inexpensive. For 2027, approved rate increases are generally similar across the metal levels offered by each carrier - there is no Silver-loading mandate with this coming year. But because the Silver-load adjustment is already embedded in the 2026 Silver premiums, comparable increases for 2027 preserve much of that pricing relationship. As a result, Silver loading continues to affect 2027 premiums and subsidies. Let's look at an example of a 40-year-old purchasing coverage in King County whose ACA household income is 300% of the Federal Poverty Level. For 2027: * The 2027 SLCSP would be $757.44, and the Federal APTC would be $349.66. * The lowest-cost Silver plan would be $378.43 after applying the subsidy. * The lowest-cost Gold plan would be $253.52 after applying the subsidy. Although a Gold plan has a higher coverage actuarial value than a standard Silver plan (approximately 80% versus 70%), the lowest-cost Gold plan in this example has a lower net premium after the APTC. This is one of the effects of Silver loading. The Bottom Line For yet another year, Washington consumers will face a higher-priced and changing individual medical market. With 23 of Washington's 39 counties seeing carriers enter or exit the market, simply renewing existing coverage may not be the best option. And because Silver loading continues to affect 2027 premiums and Federal subsidies, consumers should not assume that choosing a Silver-level plan will save them money. In some cases, a Gold plan may actually cost less than a Silver plan after the Federal APTC is applied. For agents, the message for 2027 is clear: shop the market. Compare available carriers, networks, benefits, and - most importantly - the net premium after subsidies across all metal levels before recommending a plan.

Cowles Co.
Feb 27th, 2025
Premera's mental health matchmaker service grows

Premera Blue Cross, which is headquartered in Mountlake Terrace, Washington, launched its matchmaker for behavioral health program in 2023 to reduce barriers for people experiencing mental health conditions and substance abuse disorders.

PR Newswire
Sep 16th, 2024
Premera Appoints Dr. Rushika Fernandopulle to Board of Directors

MOUNTLAKE TERRACE, Wash., Sept. 16, 2024 /PRNewswire/ - Premera today announced Dr. Rushika Fernandopulle has joined its Board of Directors.

Cheney Free Press
May 13th, 2024
Premera plans to drop MultiCare

MEDICAL LAKE - Premera Blue Cross has announced the potential termination of its coverage agreement with MultiCare, a prominent healthcare provider in Washington State.

My Edmonds News
May 3rd, 2024
Premera hires Dr. Romilla Batra as new chief medical officer

Premera hires dr. Romilla Batra as new chief medical officer.