(presented and played at pCamp Boston, May 2016) Agile product owners feel the need to be in all places, all the time, with all people. To succeed, they need to be inventive yet intensely focused; collaborative but decisive; far-sighted but detail oriented. The best product owners are strategic—envisioning the product, communicating upstream with business executives, researching the market, and continually planning for delivery of high-value product options. Yet at the same time, they are also tactical—communicating downstream with the delivery team, running product demos, and discussing technical considerations. Talk about a role that requires excellent balance and effective collaboration! We’ll explore the strategic and tactical work of agile product ownership. Then, we’ll use fast-paced game to determine the level of delegation that is appropriate for product ownership work. You’ll leave with new perspectives on ways you might lighten your load and strengthen your support system so that you can make space for the right things amidst the clutter of everything.

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Agile Product Ownership:
Do the RightThings,
Not Everything
Ellen Gottesdiener
www.ebgconsulting.com
www.DiscoverToDeliver.com
Copyright EBG Consulting, 2016
9 April 2016

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!

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product
agile goal:
deliver high value, frequently

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“The Product Owner is responsible for
maximizing the value of the product and the
work of the Development Team. How this is
done may vary widely across organizations,
Scrum Teams, and individuals.
The Product Owner is the sole person
responsible for managing the Product Backlog.”
The Scrum Guide 2014

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product work
Define and champion the product vision
Research and test customer/market needs
Identify high-value product options
Decide on release dates and content
Make backlog items “ready” for planning, dev
Accept “done” work
Conduct product demos
Decide what technical debt to tackle
Conduct competitive analysis
…

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product views

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disciplines & focus
product
management
product
ownership
development
strategic tactical
external internal
customer code
market making
business technology

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product partners

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diverse disciplines
product mgmt
bus. analysis
devOps
architecture
Ux
dev/
engineering
project
mgmt
service
product/
domain
marketing
sales
finance
strategy
Cx
test/
QA

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your turn
The “right” work
strategic tactical
NOTE: We sorted cards containing
for the work of product ownership into
the ‘categories’ of strategic or
tactical—or in-between.

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goal
collaborate
mutually support
delegate
assign
NOTE: We played an adaption of
Jurgen Appelo’s “Delegation Poker”
modified to explore delegation/
decision making for the work of
product ownership
Thank you Jurgen!

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debrief

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consider…
How can you empower your product
partners to make better product
decisions?
How can your product partners help you
make better product decisions?

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! !
! !
Training
Find your learning story
Consulting
Match to your needs
!

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thanks!
This presentation is for pCamp Boston attendees’ personal use.
We welcome you sharing, with attribution our work.
Please get in touch to do so.
No copies, in part or in whole, including but not limited to, hard
copy, print, photocopy or any electronic media, may be made or
used without express written permission of EBG Consulting, Inc.
It’s amazing you read this small print, too! Thank you.
Agile Product Ownership:
Do the RightThings,
Not Everything