In this episode, we refer to Henrik Kniberg’s “Product Ownership in a Nutshell” video and Product Mastery by Geoff Watts.
The Great Product Owner: The Customer Obsessed PO
“The role of the PO really is to help the team empathize with the user, the customer of the product, because that’s how they can develop great solutions.” – Steve Martin
This PO worked at a fintech firm and is now CPO of a major fintech company. Steve describes him as having a brilliant mind and being a real agileist—someone Steve learned a huge amount about Agile from.
This PO’s defining characteristic was his absolute obsession with the user. Everything focused on customer pain points. Working with engineering teams serving military customers, they held regular workshops with those customers to understand their pain firsthand. They were literally the voice of the customer, not theoretically but practically.
This PO pushed and challenged teams to be more innovative, always looking for better ways of providing better software. Their gift was communication—specifically, briefing the team on the problem rather than just reading out stories in refinement sessions.
This is the anti-pattern many Product Owners fall into: going through the motions, reading requirements without context. Real product ownership, as this PO demonstrated, is telling a story that helps the team empathize and understand the pain.
When teams can internalize customer problems, they develop better solutions. This PO’s ability to communicate the problem into the minds of teams enabled them to serve customers more effectively. This is the essence of great Product Ownership: not being a proxy for management, not juggling multiple teams, but being deeply connected to customer pain and translating that pain into context the team can work with.
Self-reflection Question: Do your refinement sessions tell stories that help the team empathize with customer pain, or do you just read out requirements?
The Bad Product Owner: Proxies for Management Instead of Customer Advocates
“They weren’t a team, they were a group of individuals working on multiple different projects.” – Vasco Duarte
Steve emphasizes that Product Owners often have great intentions but struggle due to lack of training and coaching. The anti-patterns are systemic: commercial managers “dressed up” as Product Owners without understanding the role. Project managers transitioning to PO roles—though Steve notes PMs can make really good POs with proper support. The most damaging pattern is Product Owners spread across multiple teams, having very little time to focus on any single team or their customers. These POs become proxies—representing the voice of senior management rather than the voice of the customer. They cascade requirements downward instead of bringing customer insights upward. The solution isn’t to criticize these struggling Product Owners but to help them understand their role and see what good looks like. Steve recommends Henrik Kniberg’s “Product Ownership in a Nutshell” video—15 minutes, 15 years old, still profoundly relevant. He also points to Product Mastery by Geoff Watts and formal training like CSPO or IC Agile Product Ownership courses. The fundamental issue is meeting Product Owners where they are, providing coaching and support to transform them from management proxies into customer advocates. When POs understand their role as empathy builders between customers and teams, everything changes.
Self-reflection Question: Is your Product Owner the voice of senior management or the voice of the customer?
Transform Your Agile Teams with Hard-Earned Lessons from Super-Experienced Scrum Masters
Do you wish you had decades of experience? Learn from the Best Scrum Masters In The World, Today! The Tips from the Trenches – Scrum Master edition audiobook includes hours of audio interviews with SM’s that have decades of experience: from Mike Cohn to Linda Rising, Christopher Avery, and many more. Super-experienced Scrum Masters share their hard-earned lessons with you. Learn those today, make your teams awesome!
About Steve Martin
You can link with Steve Martin on LinkedIn.
Steve is an Agile Coach, mentor, and founder of The Agile Master Academy. After over 14 years leading Agile transformation programmes, he’s on a mission to elevate Scrum Masters—building high-performing teams, measurable impact, and influence—and raising industry standards of Agile mastery through practical, evidence-led coaching. You can also find Steve’s insights on his YouTube channel: Agile Mastery Show.
