The Agile Product Owner

Enabling the business to harness the power

of agile delivery, at scale

The agile mindset, and what it means for the business(A 5 minute primer)

Agile development implies a profound and long-lasting impact to the way

the business thinks about delivery value

Old World Lean-Agile World

• Multiple decision makers on product vision and feature

priorities

• Often only engaged at the beginning and end of the project

(e.g. requirements, testing)

Are only involved if there

are serious “show-stoppers”

Updated on project

progress through

status reports

Multiple business stakeholders involved without

clear understanding who is primary decision

maker

Attention!

Project Status

Months

• Product Owner serves as the primary decision maker on

feature priorities and acceptance criteria

• Involved in and understands specific project details

• Engaged throughout the entire product lifecycle and

embedded as a member of the project team

Prioritizes the backlog

stories according to

business value or ROI

The Product Owner coordinates

with other business SME’s to gain

alignment on features and

priorities

Has decision making

authority (80/20 rule)

Understands the vision behind

the product being built

Inspects the product progress at the end of every iteration

and has authority to accept the work done or to provide

feedback

3

Agile thinking enables, (and requires) the business value is delivered

frequently in small intervals, under constant, and close scrutiny

The primary key to business agility is the ability to frame business value as a set of assumptions that are validated through a

continuous stream of delivery. The optimal business solution is iteratively deployed leveraging constant feedback to

maximize the learning and knowledge required to get to the best possible business outcome

1. An active business owner, known as

a Product Owner, is responsible for

defining and grooming a backlog of

business valued features

4. Work is delivered iteratively

and more frequently

3. The Product Owner acts

as the “one voice of the

customer” and is embedded

into the team acting as the

key business liaison

2. The Product Owner

works with SMEs, Users,

Customers, and other

Stakeholders to facilitate

product direction

5. Product owners also form

Product Owner Teams to

coordinate delivery of value

at scale

The agile business organization

(A 1000 foot view)

We will help the business become active solution owners, engaging in a

highly collaborative business technology partnership

• Builds the Product Owner

Organization

• Drives business engagement

• Prioritize increments of business

capability

• Drives collaboration and

coordination of delivery cross team

• Mentors Product owners

• Evaluates progress based on both

learning and success

• Provides foundation for learning

Chief Product

Owner • An active participant in collaborative

workshops

• Validates acceptance criteria for

individual stories

• Verifies functionality as part

informal and formal testing cycles

• locates valid business information

and data to feed acceptance criteria

• Provides business and system related

expertise in a timely manner

Business SME• Shapes the Opportunity

• Actively manages and prioritizes the

backlog according to business value

• Removes Team Impediments

• Business Information Hub

• Actively participates and

engages team ceremonies

• Verifies execution team is producing

valuable work

• Makes timely decisions around

product features

Product Owner1.Adopt new behaviors

based on a set of business

“agile personas” that

clearly articulate the rights

and responsibilities of

business participants in an

agile model

2. Implement interaction

model across the delivery

value stream, visualizing

how the business should

engage with technology

1. Support the definition of

the business value case

2. Decompose opportunity

into a set of business

goals

3. Explore top risks

4. Communicate between

business and Technology

1. Lead epic/story

definition

2. Release planning and

prioritization

3. Reporting on progress

4. Product Backlog

Refinement

1. Provide feedback on detailed

story development

2. Identify acceptance criteria for

stories

3. Prioritize the backlog

4. Communicate progress

5. Raise business risks/issues and

coordinate resolution

6. Drive business adoption

7. Ensure testing of requirements

against stories

1. Drives the effort to incorporate

feedback from end-users and

customers

2. Ensures that business features

are measured against business

KPI’s

3. Incorporates outcomes of

measured customer behavior

into the next set of features to

be delivered

We will provide you with operational advice and coaching necessary to successfully engaging in an agile model of scale, assistant to:

Key to the agile business engagement model is defining the Product

Owner role, and how they engage with both the business and self

organizing delivery teams

What Is Product Owner?

• A business partner representative who supports IT

delivery teams by understanding what solution will

be built, what problems will be solved, and for

whom.

• The business point of contact during the

development, deployment and sustainability of the

solution in collaboration with IT.

• Are the “on the ground” leaders who drive delivery

through to completion.

• Are responsible for making sure business

outcomes are achieved, and business needs are

understood and meet.

The Product Owners are each

dedicated to delivery teams, but

are also part of a larger Product

Owner Team

Product Owners draw on a pool of

Business Subject Matter Experts

to provide clarity on answers

relating to the business domainChief Product Owners drive macro

business prioritization and make

decisions required to deliver on value

across larger programs

Self org

Product Owners are key members

of agile Self Organizing Teams

made up of diverse specialists that

form cross functional capability

- 8 -

There are numerous models that can be used to instantiate a product

owner organization, we will help you choose the right fit based on your

contextProduct Owners can be organized based on how both business and solutions are organized, we have

helped clients adopt a number of models including:

• Product owners allocated to teams based on Geography

• Product owners allocated by Product or LOB

• Product owners assigned to a specific Platform or Service

• Housed in a Centralized unit carved off from the rest of the business

• Embedded within various business departments, using a Decentralized model

• Leveraging a virtual Community of Practice to facilitate knowledge sharing

Product Owner

Example Product Owner Engagement Models

• a dedicated role on a delivery team.

• Have full visibility into the solution

• Resolve impediments and provide feedback in “real time”

• Ensure alignment with core business needs

• Provide frequent elaboration and prioritization of work

• Throughput 50%-100%

• Quality 20% to 40%

• Customer satisfaction 50%-

100%

Product Expert

• part-time commitment with IT taking on some day to day responsibilities

• provides cadence based feedback, resolution of impediments,

prioritization of work and visibility of the solution (weekly/biweekly)

• Moderate to limited engagement with delivery team with IT acting as

Business liaison

• Throughput 20%-30%

• Quality 10%-15%

• Customer satisfaction 20%-30%

Product

Stakeholder

• Traditional Technology and Business engagement

• Limited feedback and solution visibility

• Status reporting style engagement

• Throughput 5%-15%

• Quality 5%-10%

• Customer satisfaction 5% to

15%

- 9 -

Accelerate adoption of the Product Owner mindset through an incremental

adoption approach focused on quick wins and early valueDesign the future agile business delivery

approach adoption using Agile style change

planning tools to put business practitioners

in the driver seat of agile adoptionCo-Create Adoption Model and Plan with All Business Change

Stakeholders

Build a Change Backlog

Build a backlog of adoption increments

“Story” exploration

Active ownership

Business metric validation

Value prioritization

Cross team coordination

Strategic governance

Enterprise

Operating model

Adopt an agile

business model

through an iterative

and incremental

approach

Iterate On Model

Build a Change BacklogAdopt the new model

iteratively

• Plan the rollout of new agile business

capability within your organization using an

incremental rollout approach

• Conduct business and product focused

training and workshops using immersive,

game oriented learning

• Provide business coaching and mentoring

during rollout iterations

• Refine the agile business delivery model to

continually maximize business benefits

Agile Business Adoption Model

…

Agree on an adoption “change

backlog” by decomposing

adoption work into a set of

prioritized adoption "stories"