The Great Product Owner: Empowering Teams, A Key PO Skill
Armin discusses the role of a great Product Owner (PO) in fostering team success. Drawing from an experience with a mixed team of internal and client-side members, he highlights the importance of clear communication and decision-making abilities in a client-driven setup. A standout PO, in his view, comprehends their role and limitations, excelling in making timely decisions and maintaining a pragmatic approach, even in challenging situations. They actively engage in discussions, emphasizing necessary trade-offs while demonstrating a keen awareness of the team’s needs.
The Bad Product Owner: When POs Multiply, Making Decisions in a Maze of Stakeholders
Armin shares his experience in a B2B ecommerce setting, where a multitude of stakeholders complicated the Product Owner (PO) role. The presence of proxy POs, business analysts, and various other figures led to a lack of clear decision-making. Armin underscores the importance of collaboration between the PO and Scrum Master and emphasizes the need for transparency and timely decisions. He advises making issues transparent to stakeholders and offering suggestions for improvement to address this common anti-pattern. Clear ownership and decisive action are essential for effective product ownership.
The Ultimate Guide to Supporting Product Owners as a Scrum Master
Are you having trouble helping the team work well with their Product Owner? We’ve put together a course to help you work on the collaboration team-product owner. You can find it at bit.ly/coachyourpo. 18 modules, 8+ hours of modules with tools and techniques that you can use to help teams and PO’s collaborate.
About Armin Mandara
Armin is the Head of Scrum Masters at IBM iX, a leading digital agency. With a career spanning seven years as a Scrum Master, Armin has partnered with numerous teams to successfully deliver top-notch digital products. His passion lies in enabling agile teams to achieve their goals and unleash their true potential.
You can link with Armin Mandara on LinkedIn.
