Scrum Master's service to the Product Owner
I need some help regarding the service of the Scrum Master to the Product Owner, specifically around this line "Ensuring the Product Owner knows how to arrange the Product Backlog to maximize value"
How can I learn the techniques a Scrum Master can use to help the Product Owner in this regard? Is story mapping, impact mapping and WSJF considered as techniques for this purpose? Are there any others that are more favored or commonly used?
I rely on my Scrum Master for assistance on everything from facilitation and direction to coordination and coaching. If I or the Development Team members don't have an answer, we ask the Scrum Master who either knows it, or will get it for us. They're also laser focused on maintaining the Scrum board in one of the tracking tools.
Start with asking why the prioritization of the backlog by value is critical for the success of the Scrum Team. Then take another look at the responsibilities of the Product Owner.
One technique is performing prioritization with the Dev team and Product Owner to see if a shared understanding of value exists. Could similarly perform this with Product Owner and Stakeholders and see if there is disparity.
As far as that line about "ensuring the Product Owner ..." goes, the Scrum Master is there to either train/mentor/coach based on the level of capability the Product Owner possesses in sufficiently being able to prioritize for the customers advantage. It's less about ensuring this is accurate (as that will come about in Retrospective) and more about helping them feel confident they have the necessary communication channels to be an effective customer proxy.
The Scrum Master should not attempt to be a fallback Product Owner/Product Backlog Prioritizer.
Scrum is evidence-based. Does the Product Owner know how to interpret the empirical evidence of delivery, so the Product Backlog can be arranged to maximize value?
Does the Product Owner know how to interpret the empirical evidence of delivery, so the Product Backlog can be arranged to maximize value?
@Ian Mitchell, I guess my answer would be a mixed response of Yes and No. Sometimes it is clear how the Product Owner needs to order the work by setting the appropriate goals each Sprint. Sometimes, it is not clear and this is because some of the people in the role are new to the role itself and need guidance.
I am trying to find out a list of things (practices, techniques, other knoweldge etc) that I can learn about and then teach a new Product Owner in order to satisfy this line "Ensuring the Product Owner knows how to arrange the Product Backlog to maximize value"
I am aware of the EBM guide and the concepts mentioned in it, though I wish I could get more examples on how those metrics are used and how to interpret those metrics the right way.
Steve - Have you read The Professional Product Owner?
PSPO course is a solid choice too.