Nick Stewart: The Inexperienced PO and what to do to help them

From an inexperienced PO to a PO with a clear Vision, in this episode, we explore two totally different types of Product Owners, and we learn from Nick what worked in those cases.

The Great Product Owner: The Clear Vision PO

This Product Owner behaved like a great PO from the start of the project. The PO had a clear vision for the end result and was able to filter all the requests and requirements. From the team’s perspective, the process felt seamless.

If it was only like this for all teams we work with. Listen in to learn what made this PO so productive and his approach motivating for the team

The Bad Product Owner: The Inexperienced PO

At one point Nick was working with a new and inexperienced Product Owner. This did not make things easy, and the anti-patterns quickly started to surface.

It was a coaching challenge for Nick. In this segment, we explore the techniques and approaches that Nick used to try and help this inexperienced PO.

Are you having trouble helping the team working 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 Nick Stewart

Nick has worked in the “Projects Space” for the last 5 years, initially working with business change, then in IT using Prince 2, Waterfall and ultimately found Agile organically through pain of delivering projects using the other methodologies. More recently he has taken on a Delivery Lead role which allows him to continue to learn whilst helping teams deliver continuous value.

You can link with Nick Stewart on LinkedIn and connect with Nick Stewart on Twitter.

Nick Stewart: Focus on people to define and measure success as a Scrum Master

When asking his own success questions, Nick prefers to focus on the people in the team and the team’s direct environment. He asks questions about how those people feel or act, and from that, he derives his own self-evaluation for the role of Scrum Master.

Featured Retrospective Format for the Week: The Sailboat Retrospective

There are many reasons why we prefer one or the other Retrospective format. And Nick’s perspective is no different. He has many reasons to like the sailboat retrospective format, and explains why in this episode.

Follow this link, if you want to explore how a previous guest used this specific sailboat agile retrospective format.

About Nick Stewart

You can link with Nick Stewart on LinkedIn and connect with Nick Stewart on Twitter.

Nick Stewart: 3 steps to help you improve your process

Nick shares the process a team went through to move from Scrum to Kanban. Their initial goal was not to move to Kanban, but through small steps and focusing on improving they found themselves using Kanban even without trying.

Do you wish all change process would be this simple? Listen in to learn what steps Nick went through with the team.

About Nick Stewart

You can link with Nick Stewart on LinkedIn and connect with Nick Stewart on Twitter.

Nick Stewart: Why the Definition of Done is critical for Scrum teams wanting to be more predictable

This team that Nick was working with had trouble delivering on time. When Nick looked into it, he discovered that the team did not take into account all the work necessary to adhere to the Definition of Done. Once he found that, however, he had to work with the team to help them realize what was going on, and how they could become more predictable by simply taking into account what they had committed to: the Definition of Done criteria.

Featured Book of the Week: The Goal by Elyahu Goldratt

When reading The Goal by Goldratt, Nick had a lightbulb moment. In that book, the author describes the impact that one single aspect of work can have: throughput.

The book describes how not paying attention to that aspect may destroy the ability to deliver value.

In this episode, we also discuss The Phoenix Project by Gene Kim et al.

About Nick Stewart

You can link with Nick Stewart on LinkedIn and connect with Nick Stewart on Twitter.

Nick Stewart: What to do about the Product Owner that was changing priorities mid-sprint?

Nick was working with a team that had just lost their Product Owner. The new Product Owner had a conflict of interest and was changing priorities mid-sprint. This is a common anti-pattern that many teams face.

In this episode, we talk through Nick’s efforts to help the Product Owner understand the consequences of his behavior. It’s never an easy situation to be in, but we must be ready.

About Nick Stewart

Nick has worked in the “Projects Space” for the last 5 years, initially working with business change, then in IT using Prince 2, Waterfall and ultimately found Agile organically through the pain of delivering projects using the other methodologies. More recently he has taken on a Delivery Lead role which allows him to continue to learn whilst helping teams deliver continuous value.

You can link with Nick Stewart on LinkedIn and connect with Nick Stewart on Twitter.