The Best Tips for a Quick Start as Scrum Product Owner

Well, I said it recently: 'as a Scrum team we deliver the highest value in the shortest possible time'.

That elevator pitch is too good not to use, right? At the same time, I realized that as a Product Owner I first need to determine that value together with my stakeholders. Because only then is there something to prioritize and realize together with my team.

Success only comes when my stakeholders and I have the same idea about value, I know the users of the product and... have trust in the Scrum team.

Pheww!

Determine the idea of value together with your stakeholders

Euros, dollars, pounds, money. If only it were that straightforward.

Where one company expresses its most important value in revenue or net profit, another, like NS (Dutch Railways), does so in values like safety, pleasure and affordability of service.

Still others, like startups like Felyx, express their main value in growing their userbase as quickly as possible: the number of customers. Because how else do you survive among all those other providers of electric scooters you see everywhere on city sidewalks these days? For such companies, growing rapidly in their market is more important than making immediate profit: profit will come later, first lots of customers.

Tip: Don't postpone discussing the idea of value. Make the concept of 'value' discussable, find words for it and write them down. They make it easier to quantify value and attach numbers to it.

Tip: Also describe the idea of value in your project's Product Vision. This brings it to life even more and immediately makes the idea an integral part of your new product.

But isn't the idea of value also very much about end users?

Absolutely, ten points! You and your stakeholders may have beautiful ideas about added value; as long as they don't align with your customers' needs, you won't create a game changing product or service.

Therefore know what your user feels and thinks and knows what they want. Not just today, but also tomorrow, the day after tomorrow and beyond: needs change. Following those changing needs is the best way to stay relevant.

Tip: Therefore, look for and talk to users of your product as quickly as possible. And true, those aren't your close, well-meaning colleagues. Think carefully about how you want to communicate with those users. By addressing a room? Do you want to send them questionnaires? Or, more directly, do you want to sit down with them so you can look at them and feel what they think about your new product ideas?

And how do you ensure the highest value in the shortest possible time?

The short version: By ranking everything that needs to be realized by value: the value it adds for your stakeholders and users. This way, the parts of your new product that deliver the highest value end up on top of the 'wish pile'. And yes, the parts that deliver less value are thus lower on that pile. First come, first served: the items at the top of the pile are realized earlier by the Scrum team than the items below. That pile is called the Prioritized Product Backlog in Scrum terminology.

Tip: Remember for now that determining and maintaining that pile is one of your most important responsibilities as a Product Owner.

Trust your Scrum team

As a Product Owner, you determine in close collaboration with the customer and your stakeholders what needs to be made and with what priority. But how your product is made, you leave that to your Scrum team. The better you can trust your team members and leave the how to them, the faster they can take responsibility and the better they can develop the new product.

In practice, however, I still regularly encounter Product Owners who want to let go of the how, but secretly still hold on to control. How do they do that? By simply specifying far too many acceptance criteria. And you know: the more acceptance criteria you define, the less room you give your Scrum team to determine the how themselves.

Tip: So be aware of your possible tendency toward control. And let it go as much as possible. And oh yes, watch Frozen again: 'let it go, let it flow'!

In conclusion

As a Product Owner, you are the representative of the customer and the users and thus the embodiment of the new product or service: radiate that and be the authentic owner of the product vision and value. Be enthusiastic and involved with your team and support them where needed in developing your vision.

So: Vision, Enthusiasm, Value, Prioritization and Letting Go. Yup, nobody said it would be easy. But it's a lot of fun to do, go for it!

Want to build a strong foundation? Take our Product Owner Training.