PO RoleCAN YOU HEAR ME NOW?

Belkis Vasquez McCall

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Belkis’ Persona – Senior Product Owner

Important to Know about Belkis:

▪ Has over 14 years of IT experience

▪ Spent past 6+ years leading and coaching

project teams

▪ Collaborated with other Agile experts on

defining the Product Owner role

1. “Successful people do what unsuccessful people don’t dare.

Belkis’ philosophy:

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Personas highlighted in this presentation…

Former Business Analysts

Former Project ManagersDirector of Applica-tion development

Important to know about us

▪ Are part of a globally distributed

application development group

▪ Have over 5 years of Agile experience

▪ Deliver high business value IT systems

As a PO, I use personas

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Building quality products…As a PO, I use personas

starts with you

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Vision and goals for today…

Vision

Highlight how the PO role has helped former Business Analysts and Project Managers

exercise their influence beyond project execution into product experience

“Getting our voices heard at the product level!”Goal:

Share best practices from PMs and BAs

that have transitioned to the PO role

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Explore together how as PO we can

amplify our voices at the program and

organizational level

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Highlight how the PO role has impacted

the success of our organization

2

As a PO, I use simple vision document

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Challenges we faced as Business Analysts1

As a BA, I struggled

writing big documents

that team members did

not understand

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Challenges we faced as Business Analysts1

As a BA, I struggled

with spending a lot of

time being a

requirement master to

ensure developers

understood the product

Source: http://urbantitan.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/crazy-school-teacher-300x270.jpg

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Challenges we faced as Business Analysts1

As a BA, I struggled

with the concept of

ownership and getting

the team to be aligned

with the product vision

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Challenges we faced as Project Managers1

As a PM, I struggled

with scope creep and

still meeting the

customer deadline

Sep Oct Nov Dec Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug

Inception Phase

Elaboration Phase

Construction Phase

Transition Phase

It 1 It 2 It 3

It 1 It 2 It 3 It 4

(Weekly It’s)

Sep Oct

Release Window

Nov

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Challenges we faced as Project Managers1

As a PM, I struggled

with expectation

setting and getting

everyone to understand

their role

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Challenges we faced as Project Managers1

As a PM, I struggled

with lack of trans-

parency and not

knowing the progress

of the team

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Used the four Agile principles to overcome our challenges

1. Individuals and

interactions over processes

and tools

3. Responding to change

over following a plan

4. Customer

collaboration over

contract negotiation

2. Working software over

comprehensive documentation

SOURCE: www.agilemanifesto.org (March 2008)

As a PO, I use value the agile principles

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PO practices from former BAs and PMs that helped them develop better products

1 As a PO, I use…

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Best practices from Business Analysts that have transitionedto the PO role

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As a PO, I write

simple, ‘Just in time’

documents that team

members can easily

understand

As a PO, I use…

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Best practices from Business Analysts that have transitionedto the PO role

1

As a PO, I encourage

the team to be part of

design and

requirements

discussions to ensure

collective ownership of

the product

As a PO, I use…

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Best practices from Business Analysts that have transitionedto the PO role

1

As a PO, I sign-off

requirements and

features to help move

the release forward

As a PO, I use…

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Best practices from Project Managers that have transitioned to the PO role

1

As a PO, I use scope

burn down to track

scope creep and help

the sponsors make

trade-offs

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Best practices from Project Managers that have transitioned to the PO role

1

As a PO, I use the

sprint burn up chart

to understand our

progress and indentify

risks

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Best practices from Project Managers that have transitioned to the PO role

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As a PO, I leverage

sprint artifacts to get

everyone to understand

their role

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IT leadership explains how the PO role has impacted the success of our organization

2As the director of

Application Development

my perspective on the PO

role is…

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Becoming Decision

Maker

BUILDING BETTER

PRODUCTS!

Adapting light weight practices

Our practices have evolved with the PO role2

Translating

requirements

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Start exploring how POs can amplify their voices at the program and organization level

3As a PO, I’m adapting to

changes in the role

Product Genesis Product Creation Product Evolution

Planning produc-

tionreleases

PresentWork on activities from current

sprint

PastClose-out open

stories from

previous sprints

FutureWork on

preparing/

prioritizing

stories for 2-3

sprints ahead 2

1

4

3Sprintcycle

activities

▪ User research

▪ Rapid Prototyping

▪ Personas

▪ Story boarding

▪ High-level Backlog

▪ Usage analytics

▪ User research

▪ User behaviors

▪ Enhancements

▪ Evolving needs of the market

DECISION TO MOVE FORWARD WITH SOLUTION

VALUABLE FUNCTIONALITY AVAILABLE TO USERS

NEXT 2-3 FUTURE RELEASES

Product Owner involvement in the product experience

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Key ingredients for being a Product Owner that is heard and successful

Can You Hear

Me Now?

PO Role

Creates collective ownership of the

product vision and roadmap

Works with stakeholders and team

to manage scope and priorities

Empowered to make decisions and helps

the team adapt to evolving user needs

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Lessons learned with transitioning to the PO role

Getting stakeholders and team members used to

‘just in time’ requirements takes time

Taking on a leadership role for a release is

rewarding but can also be overwhelming at first

The constraints with time, forces you to make

decisions now and not put them off for later

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Group exercise