The Scrum Agile method calls for a single Product Owner to be engaged with the project and empowered with absolute authority to make any and all decisions related to the final deliverable, while being immediately available to the team to resolve issues and answer questions.
Have you seen any organization extend this type of autonomy and time commitment to an individual playing the role of Product Owner? Saving Changes...
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Vee ClarkProduct Owner/CSM/Project Mgr/SBA Consultant| Consulting CoO Fallon, Mo, United States
Only once have I experienced such an organization. We had a dedicated team room with accommodations for the Product Owner (PO) in which they were 90% present in the room with us. When the PO was not present in the room, they were always accessible with a phone call or email to make decisions and/or resolve issues.
BUT, that type of commitment is very rare for organizations. In my experience since that time, usually the PO has other duties whereas they cannot commit a significant portion of their time to the project. And, if they have assigned a ‘backup person’ - that person usually doesn’t have the authority to make final decisions. The team has to be very accommodating and patient with Product Owners deficit of time and commitment to the project. Saving Changes...
I have seen several of these, and it was mostly because the Product Owners were the absolute technical masters of the technology that was being deployed. The company had acquired a smaller company, with these folks, and had to depend on them to be the PO in the Scrum methodology. The challenge was they were also the bottleneck because they had to be the PO for multiple projects. So even though they had the autonomy and authority, it ended up hurting the project timeline because you just couldn't get the time you needed from them to make decisions and drive the project fully. You had to be the PM who screamed the loudest to get your project done. Saving Changes...
Which textbook?
What I learned about the PO in my Scrum Master class was a little different from what I learned about the PO in my PO class, and it wasn't just because of the differences in depth and breadth of the PO role covered by the classes. The same is true for the CSM role.
In real life, I'm seeing similar situations as I've seen with the BA role - each company has it's own interpretation of what a BA is, same with POs. In some companies, POs grow out of the BA role. In others, they were previously Product Managers; similar, but not identical. Part of this is due to education; leaders need to understand the PO role in order to support them in filling the role. If a company has recently made the transition to Agile, and leaders don't understand the role, there is the risk for either conflict or the POs not being as effective as they could be. Saving Changes...
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