The 3 Accidental Saboteurs of Effective Product Ownership…

1. Role Clarity/Confusion
2. Alignment
3. Empowerment 

In my experience in coaching Scrum Product Owners in organizations that are on a journey toward greater agility, I see these “3 Characters” show up in a variety of ways, and all with the similar impacts/outcomes:  The Product Owner is checked out, unresponsive, dis-engaged, unwitting and stressed out. And for those who know Scrum, this has a serious set of trickle down implications.

I'm calling these "3 Characters" accidental because I don't believe there is anything less than positive intent in most organizations. For a whole host of reasons, these "3 Characters" show up, and trip up your organization's success. 

So, let's explore the TOP 3.

#1 Role clarity and confusion are two different, but similar sounding, issues.  Role clarity is about a few things as I see it: Is my title Product Owner and do my duties describe what I am supposed to be doing. Do I understand these things. If my title isn’t clearly Product Owner, are my duties clear. And, not only am I clear about it - but are others clear about what to expect from me. This points to the next , similar sounding issue - Role confusion. Are we all on the same page about who is doing what between Product Management, Product Marketing, Systems Engineering, Business Analysts, Project Management, etc…

#2 Alignment. This is linked, slightly, to the one above. If I’m not clear or my organization isn’t clear about my role and what organizational partnerships I should have, its quite likely I’m not getting invited to certain and sundry strategic forums to ensure what I am refining in the product backlog in preparation for my team’s planning, is in fact in alignment with product and organizational visions and goals. In this case, what I’m working on could risk being out of alignment.

#3 Empowerment. The role of the product owner, as it is referenced in the Scrum guide (page 5), says that the Product owner is the single voice into the development team in terms of what to work on, when its needed and the priority of that work. Because of the two issues listed above, especially #1, the Product Owner may feel like their ‘authority’ is constantly being usurped by others. Part of this can be addressed by the Product Owner understanding what it is that is expected from their role, the other part of this is organizational…and the organization’s understanding how this role could be most effective up in their system.

Here are the answers to that test:

Role clarity - NO. Role Confusion - YES. Alignment - NO. Empowerment - NO. You guessed it and probably assumed right - all of this is going on at the same time! So, where does this leave our Product Owner, your team and your organization?

This is the stuff that is BEYOND the User Story! Yes, User Stories are important AND... This is about understanding the role and helping your organization better understand and define it. This is about getting clarity in your role, understanding where the partnerships are in your organization, establishing yourself credibly in your position and getting your team working on high impact, high outcome work that ensures satisfied customers. So how do we address this?

In my public workshop "BEYOND The User Story", we'll get into the who, what and when of role definition, prioritization strategies, stakeholder assessment, refinement structures and more!

Very Early Bird Registration is ending on January 4th. These classes have limited seats so secure yours right away! Click here for more details and to get registered: GET REGISTERED. To get a special group discount, use this LinkedIN PROMO code: LINKEDIN10 to register.

 #scrum, #agile, #leadership #ProductOwner #publicworkshops