Practical roadmap for value driven product owner excellence The product owner is vital for the effective transformation of the organization. This presentation provides a practical roadmap to product owner excellence. We discuss BABOK framework and a business analysis approach for product owners - defining key concepts and methods for success. We touch on: The Business Analyst, Agile - the manifesto, and the Product Owner; PO and BA differences and similarities; Three key differentiators for Product Owner excellence. Professional Product Owners - pivotal in leading organization growth

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The Agile Product Owner
PMICIC PDD, Indianapolis, 23rd October
2015
Michael Nir
President Sapir Consulting
All rights reserved to
Sapir Consulting

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Michael Nir
• President @ Sapir Consulting US LLC
• M.Sc. Engineering, PMP®, SAFe™ accredited
• Author of 11 bestseller business books
• Global clients - telecoms, hi-tech, software
development, R&D environments and petrochemical
& infrastructure
• Integrating the hard and soft parts of Business,
Development and more
cs.com-m.nir@sapir
The Agile PMO – great results NOW
Starting with the end in mind
• Professional Product Owners – crucial in
successful Agile/Scrum – where do we fail?
• This presentation follows a one day workshop:
The empowered Product Owner
The Agile PMO – great results NOW

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What will we discuss during the
presentation?
AGENDA
 The Business Analyst, Agile - the manifesto, and
the Product Owner
 PO and BA differences and similarities
 Three key differentiators for Product Owner
excellence
Business Analyst
PAIR EXERCISE
 Capture on the handout:
 What is the role of the BA?
 What are the primary activities a BA
performs?

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Business Analyst
 BABOK: BA – a practitioner of business analysis;
 Business Analysis: the set of tasks and techniques to
work as a liaison among stakeholders in order to
understand the structure, policies, and operations of an
organization, and recommend solutions that enable the
organization to achieve its goals.
DEBRIEF - BABOK
Business Analyst
DEBRIEF - BABOK

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Agile approach
PAIR EXERCISE
 Capture on the handout:
 What is Agile?
 What are the Agile values?
Debrief – “Agile” – adaptive
iterative…
 Catch all phrase
 Broad range of adaptive approaches
 No single discrete approach, though
Scrum seems to be the current winner
DEBRIEF

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Starting point
AGILE MANIFESTO
Source:
http://agilemanifesto.org/
Agile culture – 12 principles (1)
The Agile PMO

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Agile culture – 12 principles (2)
The Agile PMO
Agile approach - Scrum process
The Agile PMO

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Product Owner - sole value creator connecting
business to development and operations
Product Owner
PAIR EXERCISE
 Capture on the handout:
 What is the role of the Product Owner?
 What are the primary activities a Product
Owner performs?

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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.
Product Owner
DEBRIEF – SCRUM GUIDE
The Product Owner is the sole person responsible for managing the Product
Backlog:
 Clearly expressing Product Backlog items;
 Ordering the items in the Product Backlog to best achieve goals and missions;
 Optimizing the value of the work the Development Team performs;
 Ensuring that the Product Backlog is visible, transparent, and clear to all, and
shows what the Scrum Team will work on next; and,
 Ensuring the Development Team understands items in the Product Backlog to the
level needed.
Product Owner
DEBRIEF – SCRUM GUIDE

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BA – PO ; where’s the difference???
EMPOWERING THE PRODUCT OWNER
 Some things are the same
 Areas where the Scrum Product Owner is orthogonal to a
‘traditional’ Business Analyst
 Areas where Product Ownership is missing
The context for the Product Owner – why
reinvent the wheel
THE EMPOWERED PRODUCT OWNER
 Product Owner ~ Business Analyst?

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Strategic value driven
THE EMPOWERED PRODUCT OWNER
Areas where we might enhance the Product
Owner role
ROAD MAP TO PRODUCT OWNER EXCELLENCE
1. Portfolio steering + business case
2. Eliciting and analysis tools, and slicing
3. Traceability where required

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1. Product Owner portfolio steering – aligns
and directs
ROAD MAP TO PRODUCT OWNER EXCELLENCE
New
Opportunities
Business Case
Portfolio
1. SAFe is a relevant framework to consider
ROAD MAP TO PRODUCT OWNER EXCELLENCE

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1. Agile business case – make it valued
ROAD MAP TO PRODUCT OWNER EXCELLENCE
 Are they going to read it ?
2. Analysis and modeling techniques
ROAD MAP TO PRODUCT OWNER EXCELLENCE

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3. Traceability
ROAD MAP TO PRODUCT OWNER EXCELLENCE
Elicited Analyzed
Features
User Stories
Backlog
Granularity
analysis
Moscow
analysis
Refined backlog
Func. Spec?
Testing
Must have
Should have
Could have
Won’t have
Areas where we might enhance impact the
Business Analyst role
ROAD MAP TO BUSINESS ANALYSIS EXCELLENCE
1. Team interaction skills
2. Sole point of contact
3. Alignment with Agile values

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Leadership, Influence and soft skills
ROAD MAP TO EXCELLENCE
What are the prerequisites for prince-hood
ROAD MAP TO EXCELLENCE
1. Portfolio steering + business case
2. Eliciting and analysis tools
3. Traceability
4. Team interaction skills
5. Sole point of contact
6. Alignment with Agile values

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Take away
 Table on page 4 of the handout
– complete the comparison and
define additional role and task
requirements
Next steps
SUMMARY
 Focus on value rather than form
 Make your Product Owners matter
 Train them in BA where needed
 Train BAs in PO and Agile values

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Thank You
Make your Product Owners
count!
The Agile PMO – great results NOW
Coming Next :
Agile PMO workshop
PMICIC – Carmel Indiana