Dallas Agile Camp - 2015

Integrating Product Management with Product Ownership

2

Workshop ObjectivesAligning and Empowering Product Management

• Why do we need the Product Manager / Product Owner roles?

• How do you identify your customer and product?

• Grooming a backlog (Prioritization and Socialization)

3

In order to be successful teams must…1. Have a shared vision

2. Create an understandable mental model that realizes the vision

3. Be able to learn as a team

4. Teams members must exhibit personal mastery

5. Engage in “Systems Thinking”

-- 5 Characteristics of a Learning Organization [Senge 1990]

Knowledge Work is not characterized by a strong physics model…

Software is notoriously complex – the end product is an abstraction. To deliver a functional system, every member of a software team must reference a shared

mental model that every team member understands.

-- Dan Mezick “The Culture Game”

4

Without a strong physics model we are left with shared understanding

As a Commuter I need a car that flies so I can avoid the traffic on highways

Mental Models Filters Assumptionsleadto

thatdrive

5

If it was only our Bias we Need to Overcome…

Unconscious Incompetence

Conscious Incompetence

Conscious Competence

Unconscious Competence

Source: Wikipedia

6

Great Product Managers are integrative thinkersThey integrate the Human, Business, and Technical dimensions to deliver breakthrough products that delight and improve the lives of our customers

Human-Centered Design Business Strategy & Analysis TechnologyLead and frame product efforts in terms of key consumer insights and needs

Define and ship products that are strategically bold and important to our business(es)

Be fluent in current/emerging technologies and understand implications on product and business strategy and execution

• Business leaders should be developing “table stakes” knowledge in H & T dimensions to move from Point A B

• Complement yourself with team members who spike in H & T dimensions

A

Human

Business Technical

Great Product Managers operate here

Business leaders are typically here

B

7

They apply different levels of involvement in defining and focusing on each

PM POLe

vel o

f Inv

olve

men

t and

Foc

us

WHY WHAT HOWStrategy Execution

PMs need to be grounded in “How”

as it informs progress on

“What”

Both product managers and product owners must care about and account for the why / what / how but…

POs need to be grounded in “Why” as it informs value

behind “What”

Together the Why, What & How need to be balanced.

8

Shared disciplines that span from strategic to tactical

Human

Business

Technical

Product Owner

Product Manager

• Provides thought leadership to reveal unmet needs and develop innovative solutions

• Designs for the entire customer journey

• Clearly understands customer needs through objective analysis

• Understands key business outcomes and how technology drives that value

• Communicates business outcomes in a way that enables manageable features and user stories

• Incorporates customer insights into feature design

• Acts as the voice of the team, empowered to make on the spot decisions

• Defends the end to end customer experience

• Ensures strategic alignment between business outcomes and technical capabilities

• Develops core positioning and messaging for the product

• Is an expert on the competition

• Effectively engages in technical decision making

• Considers key interdependencies across systems

• Understands current and target architectures

• Ensures delivery of necessary business outcomes

• Prioritizes and sequence the team’s work to maximize value

• Works in a 1 to 1 ratio, leading a specific development teams

• Looks outside the industry for innovation and capabilities

• Aligns business and technology strategies

• Clearly understands customer needs

• Creates and directs highly performing work teams

• Understands current and target architecture

• Possesses a working knowledge of systems

Product Management Family

9

Skills Responsibilities

• Work with executive leadership and enterprise architecture to align products with the portfolio vision

• Develop and maintain a product strategy, vision and roadmap aligned with overall business strategy

• Lead efforts with branding and marketing teams to derive the product’s key capabilities and benefits

• Work closely with leadership to define architecture, expectations for user experience, and innovations

• Specify objectives for current and future products• Lead multiple teams, ensuring alignment of iterative,

incremental development across multiple work streams and functional areas

• Effectively collaborate to ensure prioritization of new features, maintenance and non-functional requirements, technical debt and architectural enhancements

• Develop and maintain executive reporting, removing impediments as necessary

Product Manager Role - Skills and Responsibilities

• Ability to shape and sequence new intent while keeping in mind the needs of the customer

• Proven leadership within the business and market • Deep, systemic knowledge of critical business

interfaces• Influence executive leadership to garner support and

funding for initiatives• Ensure alignment of end customer needs and

proposed solutions• Able to motivate and lead multiple teams and product

owners through effective program management• Able to anticipate program risks and misalignments• Possess an entrepreneurial, startup, or corporate

innovation mindset• Proven track record of thought leadership and

practices, looking outside the business and industry for innovations and best practices

10

Skills Responsibilities

• Work with product leadership and enterprise architecture to align product plans with the portfolio vision

• Develop and maintain a product vision and roadmap aligned with business epics

• Work to communicate the product’s key capabilities and benefits to enhance adoption of the product

• Effectively incorporate architecture, user experience, and innovative product capabilities into design

• Specify requirements for current and future products• Lead the product management team in the iterative,

incremental development• Effectively collaborate to manage the distribution of

backlog items to development teams• Balance priorities between new features, maintenance

requirements, non-functional requirements, reduction of technical debt and architectural enhancements

• Develop and maintain program measures, removing impediments as necessary

Product Owner Role - Skills and Responsibilities

• Possess a holistic understanding of the business and product market

• Influence stakeholders and product managers • Understands end customer needs and perspectives

and works to define solutions in the simplest possible way

• Understanding and ability to speak to technology domain

• Intellectual curiosity and ability to work in fast-paced, complex and ambiguous environments

• Able to motivate and lead a team through energetic collaboration

• Well organized, able to multi-task, and able to prioritize Compelling and effective communication with team and stakeholders

• Excellent negotiation and relationship building skills• Excellent judgment and decisiveness• Able to anticipate risks, manage issues and clear

obstacles

11

Workshop ObjectivesAligning and Empowering Product Management

• Why do we need the Product Manager / Product Owner roles?

• How do you identify your customer and product?

• Grooming a backlog (Prioritization and Socialization)

12

Agility Spans the Organization and Value StreamUncertainty increases

13

Value Stream Mapping

Submit Loan for Processing

Send to Underwriting

Send for Final Approval

Wait forDisbursement

Do Something Valuable for Customers

Generate Income from Customers

14

Typical Value Stream Mapping Activities

Define High-Level Process Steps

Use Simple Use Case to Add Processing Details

Identify End Product

Include Additional Complexity

Identify Barriers, Issues and Opportunities

Add Environmental and Tool Details

• What flows from idea to production?• What is the final product?

• Map out the steps necessary to move from idea to production

• Take basic use case through the process

• Add necessary details (e.g. cycle time, touch time, WIP, defects)

• Add server names, tools used• Document timelines, how teams

handle builds/testing/deployments

• Work though remaining use cases to uncover dependencies and external interfaces

• Include exception handling and defect process

• Include all the steps necessary to get ideas out the door

• Highlight opportunities, pain points and bottlenecks

15

Team

Scaling Level

Portfolio

From Needs to Value: Intent Flow

Epics

Features / Sub- Epics

Features / Sub- Epics Features

/ Sub- Epics

Stories

What / How Hierarchy

2+ Program Increments

2-3 Sprints

1-3 Days

Evidence of Progress & Success

What

How

What

How

Success Criteria

Acceptance Criteria

AC Every Sprint

Every Increment

Major Release

Localized Execution

StrategicExecution

16

Workshop ObjectivesAligning and Empowering Product Management

• Why do we need the Product Manager / Product Owner roles?

• How do you identify your customer and product?

• Grooming a backlog (Prioritization and Socialization)

17

What is a backlog?

• If something is in the backlog it MAY get done

• If something is not in the backlog it WON’T get done

• A backlog is a prioritized queue– Queues create variability– Avoid overwhelming team with

never-ending backlogs

• Coupled backlogs reduce predictability (covariance)– Cross backlog coupling must be

resolved either at prioritization or at planning and monitored through localized execution

Higher Priority

Lower Priority

Fine grained, detailed, well understood, ready for implementation

Coarse grained, less detailed (Socialization)

Items can be added, modified, removed or

re-prioritized

Intent

18

What are the elements of a backlog?

• Functional Intent– Describes what we need the solution to do– Form: Epics

• Temporal Intent– Describes when we need the Epics completed– Form: Roadmap (updated and informed through execution)(captured on the epic)

• Intentional Architectural Intent– Describes constraints to the way the solution must work (Constrains and informs the

“How)– Form: Architectural Epics & Features

• Evidence of Completion– Describes what the success criteria would be for the solution– Form: Acceptance Criteria on Epics, Features and Stories, Demos (in execution)

19

Success Criteria

How do the Elements Come Together into Backlog?

Intentional Architecture Evidence of Completion

Temporal Intent

Business EpicBusiness

EpicBusiness EpicBusiness

Epic

Functional Intent

Architectural EpicArchitectural

EpicArchitectural

EpicArchitectural

Epic / Feature

Business Epic

Architectural Epic

Business Epic

TimeWhat is Needed

Constraints on How

Proof its Done

When its

Needed

When it Can be Done

NFRs

Bac

klog

20

A Backlog IS a Prioritized Queue – How do we Prioritize it?

• Loudest Voice– Not a great way but the way most immature teams do it

• Using Relative Estimation– T-Shirt Sizing, Modified Fibonacci, etc.

• Moscow– Must, Should, Could, Won’t

• Business Value– Impact on Value Stream, Subjective Relative Estimation

• Lean Economics – Weighted Shortest Job First– Cost of Delay (Time Criticality + Opportunity + Business Value) / Size

• Learning / Experimentation– Very useful in competitive an/or novel solutions

You Must Pick one

21

Relative Estimating

Adapted from Mike Cohn. Agile Estimating and Planning. 2005

Estimating poker combines expert opinion, analogy, and disaggregation for quick but reliable estimates

Each estimator

gets a deck of cards

Product owner reads

a story

Estimators privately

select cards

Cards are turned over

Discuss differences Re-estimate

Participants include all team members The product manager/owner participates, but does not estimate

Steps

22

The Fibonacci Sequence

A modified Fibonacci sequence is used to reflect the inherent uncertainty in estimating large items

1 + 0 = 11 + 1 = 22 + 1 = 33 + 2 = 55 + 3 = 88 + 5 = 13

2040

100?

Accuracy vs. Precision If we continued the true

Fibonacci sequence, we would have the following numbers:

21 34 55 89 144

This implies precision which can result in a false sense of accuracy

23

How Much Time to Spend Estimating

A little effort helps a lot A lot of effort only helps a

little

50%

100%

Acc

urac

y

Effort

It’s better to be approximately right, than precisely wrong!

Diminishing Value

24

Socialization using the 3 C’s

Card, Conversation and Confirmation

Card Can be a Epic,

Feature, Story Contains all

the 4 forms of Intent

Defines the scope of the conversation

Informs as to who should be involved in the conversation

Conversation

Ongoing dialog between Intent Owner and How supplier

Dialog is n-way among aligned stakeholders (Dev, Arch, PM, PO, Test, AE, etc.)

Various How discussions may modify the Acceptance Criteria or identify new Architecturally Significant Capabilities

Confirmation Captured as

Acceptance Criteria on the Card

In ATDD can be Tests

Agreed upon through conversation

Will have evolving meta-data (Size, Backlog Priority, etc.)

25

Questions?