7 minutes to read With insights from... Patrick Joder Principal Business Analyst patrick.joder@zuehlke.com According to the official description by Scrum.org, the Product Owner is responsible for ‘maximising the value of the product resulting from the work of the Scrum Team’. Recently, things have been changing. Digital transformation is not only altering highly complex processes and outdated legacy systems but also affecting leaders and employees – and thereby the role of the Product Owner. The authority and responsibilities of the Product Owner have significantly increased in recent years due to digital transformation. Based on our own experiences and insights, we will share the skills and knowledge a Product Owner 2.0 needs to successfully execute projects and deliver great products. Multiple skills under one roof Fundamentally, the Product Owner (PO) is the linchpin in projects. To fulfil this role effectively, they must unite a variety of skills within themselves or their team, including: Business model Business model Understanding the business model and the company vision behind the product. Market Market Awareness of the value proposition and focus of their own product, and knowledge of market analysis, including understanding which competitor’s product the customer might switch to and why they do not (USP). Technology Technology Knowledge of which technologies can be valuable for their product (cloud, AI, specific frameworks, CI/CD, automated tests). Experience Experience Understanding the importance of an outstanding user experience, as well as the target audiences and their demands and needs. Domain Domain Knowledge of the opportunities and risks, as well as trends within the relevant industry, and whether the necessary expertise exists within the company to make informed decisions. Ability Ability The Product Owner does not need to handle everything alone but must recognise that these skills are required within the team and that they may need to be developed. It is impossible for an individual to possess all these skills and perspectives and to accomplish the task alone. Therefore, a central task of the Product Owner is to involve and empower the team to understand and apply different perspectives in analysing and implementing ideas and requirements. Graphic: The product owner must have a range of skills, as this graphic shows. Holistic consideration of all activities In addition to the skills described above and the involvement of the entire team, further tasks fall within the responsibility of the Product Owner. The Product Ownership Cycle offers an overview of the versatility and typical interactions of a Product Owner. Based on our experiences, a rough standard process can be defined for the successful implementation of projects or products, which follows the shown Product Ownership Cycle: The first step involves market research, defining the value proposition and business case as part of the product research. The Product Owner works closely with Sales & Marketing to set a direction for product development. In the second step, plans become more concrete. Involving the Business Owners, the vision statement, product strategy, and product goals are developed. Building on this, the initial iterations are planned, and the roadmap is defined based on the vision and product goals, including releases and launches. Once the launch is successful, the team liaises with specialists to determine which features should be further developed. An overview of individual user stories and features is provided by the story or feature map. The individual user stories are then validated in grooming/refinement sessions (for example, using the 3 Amigos method) and prepared and prioritised for the sprints, allowing them to be implemented and tested incrementally. A few weeks post-launch, user feedback and measurements, which should be set up early, provide insights into user behaviour, performance, throughput time, and volume. This forms the basis for making adjustments – possibly reverting to market research. In the daily hustle, it is easy to lose track. Tasks are postponed, appointments forgotten, and important details overlooked. To counteract this and ensure the product's success, regular checks based on the cycle are essential. The Product Owner acts as a manager and does not need to handle all tasks alone. Key task: stakeholder management The most important source for deriving and defining product requirements is people. In the product context, these relevant individuals are called stakeholders. They can influence the costs, schedule, specifications, resource allocation, outcome, or perceived success of a product. It should be known that stakeholders need to be managed. Another strategic tool is the Stakeholder Salience Model, which shows various stakeholder behaviours that can positively or negatively impact the product's involvement and content. For instance, ‘sleeping stakeholders’ possess a lot of power but provide little support. It is important to monitor these individuals or groups and minimally inform them. ‘Demanding stakeholders’ are highly energetic in pushing their issues; however, there are more important people to collaborate with. ‘Dominant stakeholders’ have a lot of power and legitimacy but provide moderate support. They are crucial for the product and might have little interest and energy to engage. Consider how to spark and maintain their interest in the product without overly involving them. This can be key to the project's success. Definitive stakeholders require close management, dominant and dangerous stakeholders should be satisfied, dependent individuals and groups should be kept informed, and sleeping, demanding, and legitimate stakeholders need to be monitored. It is important to note that these are fundamental, theoretical guidelines. The Product Owner's task is also to deviate from these if deemed necessary for the product's success. From vision to implementation as a team In conclusion, how does a product vision become the actual product that meets the users' needs and requirements? We will demonstrate the role of user stories, which provide the necessary pieces for the product to be realised. The following graphic shows the dependencies between the strategic and operational levels that the Product Owner and their teams should anchor in their project routine. The Product Owner is responsible for the following strategic levels: Product vision Duration: 5 years Product strategy Duration: 1-3 years Product roadmap Duration: 6-12 months The product vision describes the target image, i.e., where the product is seen in the long term, what the team under the Product Owner’s leadership can contribute, and why the team does what it does. The product strategy, on the other hand, focuses on market positioning and ensures that the product finds its place in the future market. What concrete steps must the team take to achieve the vision? The product roadmap, a mid-term planning tool, provides answers. It also serves as an interface to operational product development. The product goals in the roadmap explain a future state of the product that can serve as a planning target for the Scrum Team (see Scrum Guide). Whether the product goals are formulated using the SMART method, in the form of OKRs or KPIs, the most important factor is always the content commitment of stakeholders and the entire team. The Product Owner must ensure or be confident of this commitment. Unlike the product vision, product goals are plannable and divided into epics for implementation. Based on a user story map, the respective epics can ultimately be broken down into stories. This corresponds to a horizontal alignment of the product and provides insights into dependencies and launches of MVPs and releases down to the smallest sprint level. Ignore gut feeling: measure effectively A comprehensive approach to successful product development is also provided by Evidence-Based Management (EBM). In other words – data over gut feeling. Four Key Value Areas are examined and answers to the following questions measured: The Key Value Areas assist the Product Owner and their team in planning and implementation. The measured values provide an objective basis for stakeholder management and improve decision-making, as they rely on data defined and measured before the launch. As decisions can be made in a well-founded and sustainable manner, EBM also fosters team motivation to participate in the process and support the results. source: scrum.org The product owner as a key role in product success As a key figure in an agile team or the entire organisation, a Product Owner is more essential than ever in successfully implementing business-critical products. In this role, they combine business knowledge with an understanding of the market, technology, and user experience. They manage teams effectively based on the required skills. The Product Ownership Cycle provides a framework for the diverse tasks that need to be regularly reviewed and adjusted. A structured approach from vision to strategy to testable stories is a must. Evidence-Based Management helps the Product Owner, team, and stakeholders make decisions based on data from diverse perspectives. Considering all these aspects and delving deeply into a specific context while maintaining an overall view of the product is, in our view, the main task of a successful Product Owner in times of digital transformation, elevating them to a Product Owner 2.0: Learn more here.
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