Presentation I used at Philadelphia Day of Agile (#dayofagile) http://dayofagile.org/agenda. It was received well within the audience. Any comments are welcome...

1. Agile Product Owners - What Ails Them?
-Anupam Kundu

2. A Short Story of Business and IT

3. Failed Products / Failed Companies
11-Sep-11 3

4. No Hiring Freeze!!!
11-Sep-11 4

5. Who is a Product Manager?
…who investigates,
selects and develop
one or more products
for an organization...
…Delivers more value
than the competition
…Creates a sustainable
competitive difference
…Generates business
benefit to the
organization
Wikipedia

6. World of Product Management
strategy, forecasts,
budgets, staff, commitments, roadmaps,
targets competitive intelligence
Executives
Field input,
market information, priorities, Market feedback
requirements, roadmaps, MRDs, Product
personas, user stories… Management
Mktg & Markets &
Development
Sales Customers
software
Segmentation, messages,
benefits/features, pricing,
qualification, demos…
Inspired from Rich Mironov, author of “The Art of Product Management”
11-Sep-11 6

7. Product Management in Large Tech Companies
Listens to
the Market
Talks to
the Market
Builds the
Product
11-Sep-11 7

8. “We are Agile”
Product Managers became Product Owners…who
makes decisions about
what the product should do while taking into account what
people who make buying decisions actually want... Jeff
Patton
• Assure team is pursuing a common vision
• Establish priorities to track business value
• Act as ‘the customer’ for developer questions
• Work with product management to plan releases
• Plan, elaborate and accept user stories and iterations
11-Sep-11 8

9. Product Owner Attributes
•Subject Matter Expert •Business Advocate
– Understand the domain well – Understand the needs of the
enough to envision a product organization paying for the
software and selects a mix of
features that cater to their goals
•End-User Advocate •Communicator
– Describe the product with – Capable of communicating
understanding of users and use, vision and intent to the team and
and a product that best serves the stakeholders alike
both
•Customer Advocate •Decision Maker
– Understand the needs of the – Given a variety of conflicting
business buying the product and goals and opinions be the final
select a mix of features valuable logical decision maker about
to the customer what goes into a release
11-Sep-11 9

10. Holistic View of Product Management
market information, priorities,
requirements, roadmaps, wireframes,
personas, user stories
build know-how alpha launch, beta testing,
minimum viable product,
ideas /
refinement monitoring and
listening
five whys, product Real-time monitoring,
roadmap, forecast, analyze product- alerts, funnel analysis,
competitive intelligence, market fit pricing feedback,
Stakeholder inputs segmentation

11. Challenge#1: Product Owners’ Influence Spheres
Portfolio
Division level Strategy
objectives and goals
Product roadmap and
Prioritized product business strategy
road map
Release
What business
Product objectives will each
Business objectives release achieve?
fulfilled by the product
What capabilities will
Product Vision the release offer?
Product life cycle Release plan
Sprint Daily
Planning story
What stories must backlog
be included in the
Story Details
sprint to achieve
release objectives? Acceptance
Tests
Iteration Plan
Sprint
velocity/capacity
11-Sep-11 11

12. Spheres of Influence Symptoms
Absentee Product Owner
-No clear product vision
-Limited interaction and
showcases
-Too many conflicting
priorities

13. Challenge#2: Organizational Model & Culture
• Innovation & Risk taking
• Stability & Control
• Attention to detail
• Outcome orientation
• People orientation
• Team orientation
• Aggressiveness
http://www.buzzle.com/articles/primary-characteristics-of-organizational-culture.html

14. Organizational Culture Symptoms
Un-empowered Product
Owner
-Decisions are
overridden by other
departments and
individuals
-No power to influence
technology or staffing
choice
-This is the way things
get done around here

15. Challenge#3: Business Model Validation

16. Business Model Symptoms
•Limited or no engagement by the Product Owner with Strategy team
•Too many process / organizational hurdles to get buy-in
•No clear product or release vision prepared or shared
•Absentee stakeholders
•Continually delayed launch dates
•Extensive rework just before and after launch
11-Sep-11 16

17. Challenge#4: Arrogant PO
11-Sep-11 17

18. Arrogant PO Symptoms
•Limited or no engagement with engineering team
•Too much hand-waving instead of accepting realities
•No respect for any metric
•Public reversal of tactical team decisions
•Treats humans as machines

19. Connect the Challenges
No Business
Spheres of
Influence Model
Validation
Organizational
Model
and Culture
Arrogance
and
Ignorance
11-Sep-11 19

20. Connect the Dots
No Business
Spheres of
Influence Model
Validation
Organizational
Model
and Culture
Arrogance
and
Ignorance
11-Sep-11 20

21. Product Owners in large corporations vs. startups
Slow to move or change vs. Moving fast
Focus on process vs. Focus on outcome
Risk averseness vs. Risk adoption
Pass the buck vs. Yes, we can
Low participation vs. High-impact per person
Lack of innovation “soul” vs. Pivoting ideas for new markets
Existing business models vs. Searching for new and repeatable ones
www.SteveBlank.com
No mentoring vs. Constant learning

22. Think
differently!
Blog.stackoverflow.com

23. Corporations getting back
into venture funding
-Start-ups
-Incubators
-Partner Ventures
http://www.mercurynews.com/busin
ess/ci_17630231

24. Examples

25. Spawn Entrepreneurial
Culture
-Value creation
through innovation
-Enough freedom to
fail and grow for
everyone
- Build leaders

26. Keep focus on business
value
-Continually balance
all stakeholder risks
against business
value
-Execute iteratively
and incrementally
- Use metric
intelligently

27. Build Cross-Functional
Product Teams
-Harness the
intelligence of the
whole team
-Align authority with
responsibility
- Align responsibility
with capability

28. Orchestrate, Don’t Manage

29. Product Centric Development Teams
“…high-performing class of “product-centric” development
teams that characteristically support their company’s value
chain, partner with both their customers and business
stakeholders, and own the business results that their
software delivers… “
Forrester Research on Product Centric Development
11-Sep-11 29

30. Interesting Trends

31. People-centred than process centred
Customer focused
Innovation inclined
Move fast
Respond to feedback
Self-organizing
High trust
Quality obsessed
Collective Ownership
(sounds like Agile principles)

32. Good Reads

33. Questions??

34. THANK YOU
Anupam Kundu
Lead Consultant, ThoughtWorks
www.Linkedin.com/in/Anupam
#mydibba
Tale of Two Product Owners
(http://bit.ly/fQMkXR)
Plight of Product Owners
(http://bit.ly/agileproductowners)
2020 Best CIO Acceptance Speech
(http://bit.ly/duxAgy)
Product Road-mapping using
Agile Principles
(http://bit.ly/abfM4X)

35. Image Courtesy
•Orchestrate, don’t manage (ThoughtWorks Studios)
•Build Cross-functional Teams (http://www.flickr.com/photos/activefree/137467210/)
•Spawn Entrepreneurial Culture (http://www.geoffsnyder.com/the-entrepreneurial-rift)
•Business Model Image (Jason Furnell, ThoughtWorks) / Alexander Osterwalder:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Model_Canvas
•Organizational Culture Symptoms (http://www.blacktomato.co.uk/44035/taiwan-art/)
•Focus on Business Value (Life Magazine Photography)
•Big Corporations Funding Start-ups (http://www.flickr.com/photos/nichollsphotos/2906834393/)
•Lean Start-up Book (www.theleanstartup.com)
•Arrogant Bastard Ale (http://sandiegopho.com/menus/beers.html)
•Challenge#2:Organization Culture (http://www.designofsignage.com/application/symbol/hands/largesymbols/number-
seven-7.html)
•Changing Perspectives (http://www.productmarketing.com/productmarketing/magazine/1/2/07sj.asp)
• Think Differently (http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2008/07/stack-overflow-private-beta-begins/)