Company: Root is a car insurance company founded on the simple idea that people who drive well are less likely to get in accidents, and that means they should pay less for insurance. With a small initial venture capital investment, Root was faced with the challenge of building the entirety of the technology necessary to run a car insurance carrier from scratch. Through applying techniques to gain significant engineering leverage in the short-term without compromising long-term velocity, the engineering team at Root was able to deliver successfully, creating one of the fastest venture-backed companies to ever reach a billion dollar valuation. 

Progress: We’ve been in business now for four years. In those four years, we have become the fastest growing auto insurance company, on a % growth in premium basis. Our most recent round of funding valued us at $3.65B and brought our total VC funding to $523M. In the last year and a half, we have grown our team from 60 to 700.

Values:

Embrace the love of the problem.

Question the norm.

Tackle the tough challenges head-on.

Have the uncomfortable conversations.

Ask forgiveness rather than permission. 

Judge on the merits of work.

Celebrate ambitious teamwork.

Lead with empathy. 

Filter the temptation to do the obvious. 

Invest, don’t spend.

Empower the customer to solve.

Culture: Root has been rapidly growing for the last few years. Our early signs of success are in large part due to our unwavering standards in hiring. We recognize that our product is only as good as the people building it. We look for passionate problem solvers who can find solutions by moving through the cycle of ideation to implementation with curiosity and rigor. We work together as one team and expect every team member to lead with empathy and courage.

Position: This Product Director position will be focused on building new initiatives from the ground up. You will need to be both hands on with customers to define the product as well as able to think through, alongside the business team, how to scale a business. You will have the opportunity to build and scale revolutionary products in both the B2B and B2C spaces.

You’ll be responsible for product performance, the development of product roadmaps, and the execution of groundbreaking strategic initiatives.

This role is located in either Chicago, IL or Columbus, OH

Responsibilities:

• Work across functions to define products and business plans.

• Conduct hands-on customer research to iterate on product features. 

• Maintain roadmap alignment with company strategic initiatives.
• Partner with the leadership team to achieve organizational buy-in on key product efforts.
• Identify process and organizational bottlenecks and leverage these opportunities to constantly improve efficiency.
• Be an expert with respect to the competition and leverage that expertise to drive product innovation and capture market opportunities. 

Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in Engineering, Mathematics, or another quantitative field
• 4+ years of product experience
• Exceptional leadership skills; naturally collaborative and able to work directly with a team as well as cross-functionally without direct managerial authority.
• Exceptional B2B SaaS product skills; comfortable with B2C product
• Product domain expertise spanning the customer discovery, planning, and product development process; deep understanding of customer-centric product practices; ability to mentor and develop expertise in others.
• Strong technology background, including an understanding of technical capabilities on mobile and web platforms.
• Highly analytical; excel at leveraging customer research and analytics to drive product decisions
• Superior problem-solving skills with the ability to think strategically and innovatively
• Detail-oriented; ability to multitask and prioritize projects
• Roll-up-the sleeves work ethic and “do-what-it takes” attitude to efficiently execute and drive for results in a fast-paced work environment
• Proven ability to thrive in a results-driven, fast-paced work environment