Associate Product Owner (2026 Graduates)

Appian Corporation•McLean, VA

6d•Onsite

About The Position

As an Associate Product Owner, you will kickstart your career at the intersection of business strategy and software engineering. You will be embedded within a high-performing technical team, and your mission is to support the development of high-impact internal applications built on the Appian platform. This is a "learn-by-doing" role where you will help transform complex business problems into elegant technical solutions, ensuring our internal teams have the tools they need to succeed. This role is based at our headquarters in McLean, Virginia. Appian was built on a culture of in-person collaboration, which we believe is a key driver of our mission to be the best. Employees hired for this position are expected to be in the office 5 days a week to foster that culture and ensure we continue to thrive through shared ideas and teamwork. We believe being in the office provides more opportunities to come together and celebrate working with the exceptional people across Appian.

Requirements

An ability to take a big problem and break it down into logical, smaller steps.
A genuine interest in how software is built and a desire to become an expert in the Appian platform.
Comfort with fast-paced environments and a willingness to pivot priorities as business needs change.
While you don't need to code, you should be comfortable discussing technical concepts with engineers.
Recent or upcoming graduate with a Bachelor’s degree (Technical or Business concentrations preferred, e.g., MIS, CS, Business Analytics, or Engineering).
Previous internship experience in a corporate environment, ideally within a tech, product, or project management capacity.
Exceptional written and verbal skills; you can explain a "why" just as well as a "how."
Exposure to (or a quick ability to learn) Jira, Confluence, or similar project management tools.

Nice To Haves

Familiarity with Agile or Scrum methodologies is a plus.

Responsibilities

Assist the Senior Product Owner in maintaining the team-level roadmap and communicating progress to stakeholders.
Help manage the Jira backlog by drafting User Stories and Tasks with clear Acceptance Criteria.
Participate in design sessions and UX reviews; help create basic mockups or flowcharts to visualize how features should work.
Attend daily stand-ups and sprint ceremonies, helping the team stay organized and unblocked during two-week iterations.
Cultivate a deep understanding of internal users by gathering feedback and analyzing how they use our applications.
Coordinate User Acceptance Testing (UAT) sessions, document bugs, and assist in the final validation of features before they go live.
Help draft "how-to" guides and release notes to ensure users are excited and prepared for new features.