VP of Product at Gokada Incorporated

Details

• We are looking for a VP OF PRODUCT who will be responsible for leading and facilitating the creation of all of the company’s products going forward as the company grows from a “Series-A funded” company and strives to become Africa’s largest technology “unicorn”.
• The VP OF PRODUCT will play an instrumental role in this growth, working directly with Gokada’s CEO and Board of Directors. The VP OF PRODUCT will be someone who has previously achieved the level of at least Product Manager at another world-class internet company, and who is excited to take the next step in their career by building and leading a new product organization.
• The VP OF PRODUCT will be a strategic leader, a visionary, a capable manager, and an enthusiastic advocate of Gokada’s products, brand, and ecosystem value-add. The VP OF PRODUCT will also need to be someone who can roll up their sleeves and get things done in a fast-paced, high-growth, entrepreneurial startup, and someone who is excited by the prospect of building a product organization from the ground-up.
• The job location of this role is flexible, but candidates not located in Nigeria must have a demonstrable ability to lead remote teams as well as a willingness to regularly travel to Nigeria.

Key Responsibilities
Gokada’s VP OF PRODUCT will be one of the most senior executives in the company, interacting directly with the company’s CEO and Board of Directors. They will be in charge of a broad scope of product-related activities, including:

• Product strategy: the VP OF PRODUCT will be responsible for further developing Gokada’s product strategy in a way that is aligned with the company’s vision, mission, and business objectives. This will include defining the company’s product strategy, roadmap, and feature definition of all of the company’s products.
• Product design: the VP OF PRODUCT will be responsible for designing the company’s products across all verticals, leading and interfacing with Gokada’s design and user experience teams.
• Product development: the VP OF PRODUCT will be responsible for the entire product development process for all of the company’s products, leading and interfacing with Gokada’s engineering and software development teams.
• Product growth and marketing: the VP OF PRODUCT will be responsible for managing the product growth and marketing of the company’s products, leading and interfacing with Gokada’s marketing team.
• Product data gathering and analysis: the VP OF PRODUCT will be responsible for ensuring that the relevant metrics are gathered for each product and that these metrics are continuously analyzed to facilitate product improvement. As part of this, the VP OF PRODUCT will be responsible for gathering and interpreting feedback from users of the company’s products in order to assist with design and strategy decisions.
• Structuring, growing, and managing the product organization: Gokada is a young company that is growing rapidly. The VP OF PRODUCT will be responsible for structuring the company’s product, design, engineering, and product marketing teams, and will be ultimately responsible for growing these teams and interviewing, recruiting, hiring, and supervising all employees within those teams.

Job Requirements
Given the senior nature of this role and the above responsibilities, as well as the startup / entrepreneurial stage of the company, a strong VP OF PRODUCT candidate must possess the following skills and traits:

• World class product management skills: Exposure to world-class product management practices, with at least 5 years of experience working in a world-class software product organization, reaching the level of at least Product Manager. The VP OF PRODUCT must be proficient in the use of computer software such as Illustrator, Dreamweaver, Fireworks, Visio, and Photoshop, and product management and prototyping tools such as Asana, Confluence, and Figma. The VP OF PRODUCT must be also be proficient with Microsoft Office (Word, Excel, Powerpoint) in order to create documents, analyses and content for presentations made to the business’s stakeholders, external business partners, collaborating department personnel, junior product management personnel, and consumers.
• Strong business and technology skills: the VP OF PRODUCT will be responsible for translating Gokada’s business objectives into a product roadmap, and will be responsible for leading various functions including design, engineering, and product marketing. As such, successful candidates will have diverse professional experience that demonstrates their strong business acumen (undergraduate or graduate business degrees are a plus), solid understanding of software development and technology (programming skills are a plus), and a fluency with product marketing and growth strategies.
• Entrepreneurial mindset: The VP OF PRODUCT will be joining a young, fast-growing, Series-A funded company. They will need to be able to roll up their sleeves and get things done without relying on extensive infrastructure and support. Rather, they will be tasked with building, growing, supervising and overseeing the entire product organization, including design, engineering, and product marketing functions. This is a unique opportunity to build an entire product organization, and therefore a successful VP OF PRODUCT candidate will be the type of person who enjoys getting things done and building new things.
• Strategic product vision: The VP OF PRODUCT will be responsible for the “why” of the product and what to build next. They must then align the company around their overarching vision and must ensure individual features and products are in line with business objectives, making adjustments when necessary.
• A data-driven mindset: As the leader of product, the VP OF PRODUCT must make objective, data-driven decisions. A strong VP OF PRODUCT candidate will be able to define the metrics related to product performance and track them on an ongoing basis, such as:
  • Revenue and profits
  • User activity and engagement within the product * Churn rate and retention
• Strong empathy for Emerging Market customers: Gokada operates in Africa, where issues like payments and logistics are complex. A successful VP OF PRODUCT candidate will have meaningful exposure to Emerging Markets issues (Nigeria / Africa is preferable) through prior professional or personal experiences. This experience must be of the sort that enables the VP OF PRODUCT to strongly empathize with the problems, needs, and desires of Gokada’s customers, and to be able to channel this empathy into customer discovery efforts and into ultimately building the right product experiences for Gokada’s customers.