The Agile Product Manager / Product Owner Dilemma Rich Mironov 18 January 2012

About Rich Mironov  Veteran product manager/exec/strategist  Business models, pricing, agile  Organizing product organizations  “What do customers want?”  5 startups, including as CEO/founder  Author of “The Art of Product Management” and Product Bytes blog  Founded Product Camp, chaired first product stage at annual Agile conference

4 Agenda  What does a product manager do?  Agile overview  Agile and product managers/owners  Conclusions

Disjoint Communities Product Managers Agile Community Still nearly empty, very lonely

What Does a Product Manager Do?  For commercial / revenue software…  PM drives delivery and market acceptance of whole products  PM targets market segments, not individual customers  For strategic internal development…  PM resolves competing priorities  PM drives acceptance and adoption

Development Mktg & Sales Executives Product Management What Does a Product Manager Do? market information, priorities, requirements, roadmaps, MRDs, personas, user stories… software strategy, forecasts, commitments, roadmaps, competitive intelligence budgets, staff, targets Field input, Market feedback Segmentation, messages, benefits/features, pricing, qualification, demos… Markets & Customers

Product Management Planning Horizons Daily Sprint Strategy Portfolio Product Release Exec PM Dev Team 2 wk 2-9 months many months years many years

The ideal candidate for a tough job…

Pragmatic Marketing ® Framework Pricing Buy, Build or Partner Business Plan Product Profitability Win/Loss Analysis Distinctive Competence Market Problems Marketing Plan Customer Acquisition Customer Retention Program Effectiveness Buying Process Buyer Personas User Personas Positioning Product Portfolio Market Definition Distribution Strategy Innovation Competitive Landscape Technology Assessment Lead Generation Thought Leadership Referrals & References Launch Plan Use Scenarios Require- ments Status Dashboard Product Roadmap Presentations & Demos Event Support “Special” Calls Channel Support Channel Training Sales Process Collateral Sales Tools BusinessMarketProgramsPlanningStrategySupportReadinessBusinessMarketProgramsPlanningStrategySupportReadiness Dir, Prod Strategy Prod Mktg Mgr Tech Prod Mgr © Pragmatic Marketing, Inc. All rights reserved

Nature of PM Role  No natural sequence for PM  Must work all aspects in parallel  Entire planning onion  Intensely interrupt-driven  Bottoms-up shapes top-down, top-down shapes bottoms-up  Product Management must provide strategy, judgment and integration as well as execution

Agenda  What does a product manager do?  Agile overview  Agile and product managers/owners  Conclusions

What is Agile?  Umbrella term for various software project management and engineering practices  Iterative and collaborative  More frequent delivery of smaller increments  Building quality in, not adding it at the end  Goal of potentially shippable at every iteration  Active user involvement (or customer proxy)  Self-managing teams  Incremental process improvements

Agile is an Umbrella Scrum Extreme Programming (XP) Agile Project Management Framework (APM) Crystal Methods Dynamic Systems Development Model (DSDM) Rational Unified Process (RUP) Feature Driven Development (FDD) Lean Development Rapid Application Development (RAD) Agile Methods Test Driven Development (TDD)

Discussions about Agile…  Part philosophy and religion  Part process, tools, techniques, methods  Part organizational design

Why Not Waterfall? Waterfall projects rarely deliver according to plan Requirements and estimates Coding and unit test System integration & QA Operation and maintenance Design

Fixed Vs. Variable Fixed Estimated Requirements TimeResources Time Features Plan Driven Value Driven The Plan creates cost/schedule estimates Release themes and feature intent drive estimates WaterfallAgile Resources

Agile’s Inner Loop (Development) After: Mike Cohn

Agile’s Strategic Outer Loop (PM) Markets Customers Biz Models Strategy Portfolios Funding Customers Sales Marketing Support Upgrades EOL/EOS

Agenda  What does a product manager do?  Agile overview  Agile and product managers/owners  Conclusions

Product Owner, Product Manager  Most agilists think about “product owners”  Formal part of agile team  Needs to be physically present  Driving user stories and sub-iteration decisions  Showcases are primary method of customer input  Most product managers are not agilists  Majority of work to deliver products (revenue) happens outside Engineering  Interacts with markets directly, not filtered through Sales or Marketing  Servicing multiple inbound and outbound queues

Product Owner’s Calendar Borrowed from Catherine Connor, Rally

Development Marketing/Sales Customers Executives product owner “small p” product owner priorities, requirements, personas, user stories… software

Pricing Buy, Build or Partner Business Plan Product Profitability Win/Loss Analysis Distinctive Competence Market Problems Marketing Plan Customer Acquisition Customer Retention Program Effectiveness Buying Process Buyer Personas User Personas Positioning Product Portfolio Market Definition Distribution Strategy Innovation Competitive Landscape Technology Assessment Lead Generation Thought Leadership Referrals & References Launch Plan Use Scenarios Require ments Status Dashboard Product Roadmap Presentation s & Demos Event Support “Special” Calls Channel Support Channel Training Sales Process Collateral Sales Tools Busines s MarketPrograms Plannin g StrategySupport Readines s Busines s MarketPrograms Plannin g StrategySupport Readines s Adapted Pragmatic Marketing ® Framework product owner backlog, accept work stories burn down/up

Product Manager Failure Modes Solo Product Manager fails the agile team if…  Part-timer, not engaged with team  Lack of detail on stories  Stale backlog  Handwaving and bluster  Best of intentions, but pulled in too many directions  “Build what I meant”

Product Owner Failure Modes Solo Product Owner fails the market if…  Weak on market realities  Pricing, packaging, selling, upgrades, service models, discounting, competitive dynamics  Missing from outbound teams: Marketing, Sales, Support  Trades off company-wide strategy for product features  Confuses showcase customers with broader market

PO/PM Organizational Map GM - VP PM - VP Eng/CTO product owners Product Management Organization more technicalmore market-focused

Agenda  What does a product manager do?  Agile overview  Agile and product managers/owners  Conclusions

Conclusions  Product management bridges engineering, markets and strategic planning  Agile’s focus is on improving development processes  Success requires strongly technical but market-oriented product managers  …who mentor product owners Agile PM

Contact Information

Agile (Scrum) Model Plan out 1-4 weeks work Improve process Review product Create product needs Meet daily Strategic planning After: Gabrielle Benefield