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Moving from Product Owner to Product Managet

Last post 07:33 am November 28, 2018 by Simon Mayer
5 replies
08:45 am November 26, 2018

Hi All,

Currently i'm a Product Owner with 3 devs / 1 UX /UI designer / 2 SEO's / 1 QA in my team.

We manage about 30 websites across 15 GEO's

The boss has told me that in 2019 he wants to promote me to Product Manager - Hire 2 new PO's which would report to me and split the current team into 2 - With each PO looking after a team ( new dev's / UX designer etc would be hired to fill the teams )  as we are expanding.

I'd still be over both new teams.

What i'm unsure of is what it all means in the day to day of things. Of the work I do now what will stop ? - What new tasks / responsibility will i have to undertake ?

While I know a lot of this will depend on the company and I could ask the boss - but I'd like to get some idea before asking as I don't want to ask stupid questions.

Any info would be great.

Thanks.


09:26 am November 26, 2018

Why would Product Owners report to a “Product Manager”? What problem would that solve?


09:57 am November 26, 2018

I'm not sure. I didn't build the process.

From what I understand from the other teams that have the same structure  - The PM has final say in all things and plans all things. They would give projects/task to the PO's to research / own .

 

There are 3 teams in the company - My team is the only one that doesn't have a PM - > PO structure

This is kind of one the reason for asking this question. I don't really know what will happen after the re-structure.


03:55 pm November 26, 2018

Currently i'm a Product Owner with 3 devs / 1 UX /UI designer / 2 SEO's / 1 QA in my team.

Where is the Scrum Master in that group?  If you are doing Scrum, you are missing a critical portion of the Scrum Team.

As for PM vs PO, in Scrum there is no concept of a PM.  That concept is a from other product/project management organization.  In most of the incidents I have encounter both, the PM and PO work together as a team to provide market insights and solutions to the appropriate audiences.  The PM is focused external to the customer and market demands/needs.  The PO is focused internal to provide that information uncovered by the PM to the technical teams for implementation.  In Scrum the PO does both and is respected by the company to be making the correct decisions related to the product future.

If you will be directing the work of the POs, what you are describing seems to be a Product Owner Manager.  Again, from the Scrum perspective that is not described.  

This is kind of one the reason for asking this question. I don't really know what will happen after the re-structure.

In my opinion, only you or your boss can provide an answer to that statement. Scrum has nothing to help with that because it is outside the framework.  But if you want to run your teams using Scrum, you might want to spend some time reading through the Scrum Guide to familiarize yourself with the framework and the individual roles within. 


10:16 pm November 27, 2018

I think the following excerpt from the Scrum Guide is relevant:

The Product Owner is one person, not a committee. The Product Owner may represent the desires of a committee in the Product Backlog, but those wanting to change a Product Backlog item’s priority must address the Product Owner.

For the Product Owner to succeed, the entire organization must respect his or her decisions.

You can certainly have a Product Manager <=> Product Owner structure in Scrum, but it is critical for all involved to understand that the Product Owner must be the final arbiter of what is entered into the product backlog, how it is prioritized, and how the business collaborates with the Development Team.

 


07:33 am November 28, 2018

Congratulations on your imminent promotion! Let's do our best to ensure this is a positive change for your company, its customers and employees.

Will these Product Owners be trusted to own clearly defined products?

Will they be able to set a vision for these products, manage the backlog, and be trusted to make product decisions for the team?

Will you and your boss respect the roles of Product Owners, as described in the Scrum Guide? Will you avoid the temptation to overrule the Product Owners?

Will you provide the right environment for these Product Owners to thrive; perhaps providing timely feedback at regular intervals, to guide them?

Are you really sure it makes sense to scale up in such a way?

It is possible (and very often sensible) to have one Product Owner, and one Product Backlog, even if there are multiple teams.

Trying to define products is very difficult once you have already scaled, and hired Product Owners that don't have clear product ownership. So if you must scale to multiple Product Owners, you need to get that bit clear already.

Helpful discussions:

https://www.scrum.org/resources/how-do-you-define-product

https://www.scrum.org/resources/customer-not-organization-defines-what-…

https://www.scrum.org/resources/how-do-we-know-product-definition-worki…


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