Agile project, Scrum Framework... Sound familiar?
Agility is a methodology that's all the rage, and many organizations see it as a promise of value creation and risk reduction. True enough. We're preaching to the converted here. It's a methodology that has proved its worth, and continues to do so!
But there you go.
Everyone knows or talks about agility, but to what extent?
Indeed, without fully embracing it; without understanding the very essence of this approach; without espousing its principles at the level of the product team, the organization, the customers... we try agility, we torture it, we take what interests us... and we miss out.
Far removed from traditional project management models, and often disruptive to established processes and mindsets, agility is a culture and a state of mind, rather than a means to an end.
And believe me, a company that gives itself the means to do so will develop high value-added products for its users and increase customer satisfaction.
In particular, it is through a strong "product mindset", encouraging the team to start from the user's needs to create a high-value product; to optimize processes and to stage strategic and complementary roles within the product team that agility takes on its full meaning!
Today, I'm talking about three absolutely fascinating and oh-so-valuable roles for any organization wishing to keep its customers happy. They are the cornerstone of agility, and I know them very well, as I play them every day. I'm talking about the roles of Business Analyst (BA); Product Owner (PO) and Scrum Master (SM).
Of course, we can't talk about the product team without mentioning our superhero developers, the makers/creators of the product. They are the technical core of the team. I'll leave it to my fellow developers to explain their role within a development team, and focus here on the incredible complementarity of the three roles of BA, PO and SM, and how they help lead the team and the product to success.
The roles of Product Owner and Scrum Master are major players for any organization embracing agile methodology, and particularly the Scrum framework. The role of Business Analyst is also a key one, and is very often taken on by the Product Owner in a Scrum environment (as the Business Analyst role does not exist in this framework, it's up to the Product Owner to gather requirements, challenge and prioritize them).
Before understanding the interest and power of these three roles, it's worth redefining the basics of agility and the Scrum framework, so that we're all speaking the same language. Shall we get started?
Agility is a methodology for maximizing the value of a product by delivering quickly and frequently. It is often contrasted with "Cycleen V" or "Waterfall" project management, with precise specifications and sometimes a fixed budget, scope and time line.
When you deliver a product/project underwater for months on end, and the customer discovers the deliverable when it goes into production, a lot has happened... In a complex environment that is constantly evolving; where business strategy, market/customer/user needs, or even the economic context are changing; this is where agility comes in, by reducing risks as much as possible. By delivering very frequently and transparently, we increase our ability to adapt and rectify. This increases trust, commitment, product quality and value, and thus customer satisfaction. This is precisely the mission that the Agile approach focuses on: Develop rapidly and test again and again to adapt to the challenges of the markets addressed.
Agility comes to value the elements on the left, in preference to the elements on the right:
Scrum: This is a way of applying agility. It's called a Framework. It helps people, teams and organizations generate value through adaptive solutions, based onempiricism. It's a proven way of addressing complex issues through observation, experimentation and adaptation. We gather needs; we experiment and adapt to our context and current issues. We're here to help:
- Transparency: everyone follows the product's progress sprint by sprint
- Inspection: the product team frequently analyzes the impact of the product on users.
- Adaptation: Inspection enables the team to adjust the product and adapt to changing circumstances (changing needs; economic; political; commercial; budgetary; strategic...).
If you're curious, take a look at the Scrum Guide, which details the principles, pillars and values of Scrum.
Let's get to the heart of the matter. Who among you, dear readers, can tell me what a Product Owner is actually used for?
The Product Owner's main mission is to maximize the value of the product, by orchestrating its development. When we speak of a product, we may be thinking of an App, a Software, an API, Data, an e-commerce site, a SAAS platform and much more.
The role that is (very) often attributed to the Product Owner is that of Proxy: Or the art of doing business analysis and maintaining an active product backlog, writing user stories and tests. But in reality, this role is much more comprehensive.
The Product Owner is :
- The guarantor of the product's functional quality.
- Passionate about customer satisfaction. It's his daily focus. He represents the customer and must work hand in hand with him, throughout the product life cycle.
- The strategic and operational product manager :
◦ He or she is in charge of the product vision, carrying it forward and developing it in line with market needs and the organization's business strategy.
◦ It creates and supports the Product strategy (Roadmap, release planning for example): In other words, the action plan for the product vision.
◦ He's the product's spokesperson to the organization, customers and stakeholders. He knows his product inside out and has a clear vision of the direction he wants to take it.
- Product Backlog Manager: Prioritizes requirements in a Product Backlog, writes user stories for developers, and is responsible for creating and validating product functional tests.
- The guarantor ofproduct impact. He will evaluate and measure the product's progress via KPIs deemed useful. These include the North Star Metric (a Key Performance Indicator (KPI) that represents the fundamental value a company delivers to its customers), as well as any other KPI needed to inspect the product's impact on the user, and adapt it according to the results obtained.
- The person responsible for the product's return on investment. He ensures that the budget allocated to the product is profitable.
- Last but not least, an underdeveloped role for the ProductOwner is the analysis of KVAs (Key Values Areas). These "value areas" are taken directly from Evidence Based Management, and consist of identifying key indicators to improve the product team's performance on :
- Time-to-Market: the organization's responsiveness to value creation.
- The ability to innovate: the organization's efficiency in creating value. Modulate the team's schedule to increase its capacity and availability to lead the product towards innovation (technical or functional).
- Current Value: Seek to increase the value perceived by the user (reduce irritants; develop functionality that will bring more value to users).
-Unrealized-Value: Seek out every opportunity to increase tomorrow's user value. This is the value that the customer has yet to perceive.
The Business Analyst: The Product Owner takes on the role of Business Analyst within the Scrum framework. The main role of the BA is to focus on user needs. He or she is responsible for gathering these needs in order to create a high-value product for those who use it. He or she will organize workshops, interviews, focus groups and one-to-ones in order to gather needs; he or she will challenge and negotiate them to ensure that they are valid over time and that they can bring value to the product; he or she will also seek synergies with needs to guarantee a product that makes sense for as many users as possible.
He can create specifications for the product team according to the working methodology chosen by the organization. In a Scrum environment, it's common for the specifications to be the Product Backlog itself, giving the product greater flexibility to evolve rapidly. Why is this? Because the Product Backlog is a list of items that is constantly evolving and frequently discussed with the customer, and is therefore more flexible in terms of the product's adaptability to the context.
Finally, the BA will continually interact with stakeholders/customers throughout the product's lifecycle to ensure that the need is "fresh", and to provide real value for the customer, on an ongoing basis.
As we can see, the Product Owner has a major role to play throughout the product life cycle, both in business analysis and in the strategic and operational aspects of the product. He's a communicator whose aim is to get everyone involved in the product to work towards success and customer satisfaction.
Beyond building a genuine pool of qualified needs and maximizing product value, there's another important parameter to consider in order to guarantee a product's success. Have you guessed it? It's all about people, i.e. the product team itself; their commitment, motivation and understanding of the need to better address it.
Who better than the Scrum Master to keep a team united around a common goal and help it progress in its processes, interactions and decisive choices?
The Scrum Master is a leadership role and, as the name suggests, operates primarily in a Scrum environment.
He's not a manager, because the Scrum product team is self-organized and autonomous in the way it works. The Scrum Master is the team's continuous improvement leader.
He will guarantee the Scrum framework to the team. This means animating rituals throughout the sprint; guaranteeing healthy, transparent communication within the team; ensuring that the values and principles of the Scrum framework (tried and tested) are maintained and respected; and assuming the role of facilitator to unblock conflict situations.
- He will manage processes to help the team and the organization create an environment conducive to value creation.
- He or she will deployagility and get the organization and all stakeholders to adopt it, highlighting the benefits of such an approach.
- The Scrum Master addresses the blockers, enabling the team to move forward as smoothly as possible.
- He's a facilitator who will bring the product's players together around the table to lead workshops, manage conflicts or unblock situations.
He helps product team members in their decision-making (choice of tools, technical solutions, etc.), and even in their tasks. For example, he can help the Product Owner to clarify requirements and the product vision with the team; or in managing the Product Backlog. He can help developers to better understand requirements; to improve self-testing processes and techniques; and much more.
As you can see, these 3 roles are complementary and work towards a common goal: to co-create a product that makes sense and meets real user needs.
BAs, POs and SMs will thus orchestrate their efforts throughout the product lifecycle to guarantee an organized and efficient team that delivers frequently and transparently; to guarantee a product that meets identified and qualitative needs; to guarantee a product that maximizes its value by minimizing feedback loops and that constantly evolves towards a single goal: customer satisfaction.
The common goal of any organization developing a product is to have satisfied users, using their product. These three roles are essential to achieving this noble goal.
It's a synchronized dance around the product, indispensable, everyday and, above all, passionate!
Baptiste R.
Business Analyst, Scrum Master and Product Owner
Antaes Consulting SA
