How Feedback Transforms Product Owners | Zvonimir Durcevic

Summary

Podcast Summary: "How Feedback Transforms Product Owners | Zvonimir Durcevic"

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Title: Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast: Agile Storytelling from the Trenches
Episode: How Feedback Transforms Product Owners | Zvonimir Durcevic
Host: Vasco Duarte, Agile Coach, Certified Scrum Master, Certified Product Owner
Guest: Zvonimir Durcevic (referred to as Tsvane)
Release Date: April 4, 2025

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Introduction

In this insightful episode of the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast, Vasco Duarte engages in a deep conversation with Zvonimir Durcevic, an experienced Agile Coach and Scrum Master. The discussion centers around the pivotal role of Product Owners in Agile frameworks, exploring both common pitfalls and exemplary practices through real-world experiences.

The Worst Product Owner Anti-pattern

Vasco begins the dialogue by probing into the most detrimental behaviors he's observed in Product Owners.

Key Discussion Points:

• Reluctant Product Ownership: Tsvane shares a story about a Product Owner who was a Subject Matter Expert (SME) but resisted embracing the full responsibilities of the role. This individual was external to the organization and adamantly stated, "This is not my role," thereby creating challenges for the team.
• Impact on the Team: Due to the Product Owner's reluctance, the team and Scrum Master had to assume essential responsibilities such as stakeholder communication and backlog prioritization.

Notable Quote:

“He was writing down the requirements in a mixed format, trying to translate what was in his head into sprint-friendly stories, but he didn’t want to take on the full responsibilities of the Product Owner.”
— Tsvane ([01:37])

Team Adaptation and Systemic Solutions

Tsvane elaborates on how the team adapted to the absence of active Product Owner engagement.

Key Discussion Points:

• Collaborative Responsibility: The team organically took over aspects of the Product Owner’s duties, ensuring that stakeholder relationships and prioritization processes remained intact.
• Temporary Success: This workaround was effective for a period, demonstrating that with strong team dynamics and proactive measures, Agile processes can sustain despite leadership gaps.

Notable Quote:

“The team took part of the responsibilities because this person was not taking this responsibility in their role.”
— Tsvane ([04:18])

Exemplary Product Owner Practices

Shifting focus to positive examples, Vasco asks Tsvane about the best Product Owner he has worked with.

Key Discussion Points:

• Feedback-Driven Adaptation: Tsvane describes a Product Owner who actively sought and incorporated feedback from the team, leading to significant behavioral changes that enhanced collaboration.
• Proximity and Availability: Responding to feedback about accessibility, the Product Owner began spending more time physically present with the team, facilitating timely communications and decision-making.

Notable Quote:

“He decided to sit near the team for two and a half days a week, fostering a closer collaboration and ensuring timely feedback loops.”
— Tsvane ([06:50])

Enhancing Discovery and Customer Feedback

The conversation delves into how effective Product Owners integrate discovery activities with team processes to better understand and meet customer needs.

Key Discussion Points:

• Integrated Discovery: The exemplary Product Owner involved the team in customer interviews and prototype testing, enabling a deeper understanding of user requirements and pain points.
• Iterative Learning: By participating in discovery activities, the team gained valuable insights that directly influenced product development, ensuring that solutions were aligned with actual customer needs.

Notable Quote:

“They learned a lot about what the customers need to solve their problems by engaging directly in discovery activities.”
— Tsvane ([08:30])

The Role of Openness and Collaboration

Vasco emphasizes the importance of openness and collaborative practices between Product Owners and their teams.

Key Discussion Points:

• Openness to Change: Great Product Owners are characterized by their willingness to listen and adapt based on team feedback.
• Scrum Master Support: Scrum Masters play a crucial role in modeling openness and facilitating productive conversations that encourage continuous improvement.

Notable Quote:

“The ability to create that openness is a characteristic of great Product Owners.”
— Vasco Duarte ([10:10])

Conclusion and Community Engagement

As the episode draws to a close, Tsvane provides ways for listeners to connect and continue the conversation.

Key Discussion Points:

• Networking: Tsvane encourages listeners to connect via LinkedIn for further discussions and knowledge sharing.
• Community Growth: Emphasis is placed on the importance of community in growing and refining Agile practices.

Notable Quote:

“They should end on the LinkedIn. I think the link is also in the podcast, but even the search for Dudsevic there is one.”
— Tsvane ([11:53])

Vasco wraps up by thanking Tsvane for his valuable insights and reiterating the importance of continuous learning and community engagement within the Agile framework.

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Key Takeaways

1. Active Engagement is Crucial: Product Owners must fully embrace their responsibilities to ensure seamless Agile processes.
2. Adaptability Enhances Team Dynamics: Teams can successfully navigate leadership gaps through proactive collaboration and shared responsibilities.
3. Feedback-Driven Improvement: Continuous feedback and willingness to adapt are hallmarks of effective Product Owners.
4. Collaborative Discovery: Involving the team in discovery activities fosters a deeper understanding of customer needs and drives better product outcomes.
5. Role of Scrum Masters: Facilitating openness and productive dialogues is essential for nurturing effective Product Owner practices.

Notable Quotes with Timestamps

• On Reluctant Product Ownership:
  “He was writing down the requirements in a mixed format, trying to translate what was in his head into sprint-friendly stories, but he didn’t want to take on the full responsibilities of the Product Owner.”
  — Tsvane ([01:37])

• On Team Adaptation:
  “The team took part of the responsibilities because this person was not taking this responsibility in their role.”
  — Tsvane ([04:18])

• On Exemplary Practices:
  “He decided to sit near the team for two and a half days a week, fostering a closer collaboration and ensuring timely feedback loops.”
  — Tsvane ([06:50])

• On Openness:
  “The ability to create that openness is a characteristic of great Product Owners.”
  — Vasco Duarte ([10:10])

• On Community Engagement:
  “They should end on the LinkedIn. I think the link is also in the podcast, but even the search for Dudsevic there is one.”
  — Tsvane ([11:53])

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This episode offers a comprehensive exploration of the Product Owner role within Agile teams, highlighting both cautionary tales and success stories. By emphasizing the importance of feedback, adaptability, and collaboration, Vasco and Tsvane provide actionable insights for Scrum Masters and Agile Coaches aiming to enhance their teams' effectiveness.

Transcript

[Vasco]

Have you ever wondered what it really takes to make Agile work well? At the Global Agile Summit, we're bringing you real life first person stories of Agile succeeding out there in the real world that will inspire you to take action. Whether you're a leader, a product innovator, a developer, you'll hear practical insights from those who've done it. They'll be telling their own stories from the stage. I'll tell you more about this at the end of this episode. So stay back and listen to the full detailed description of what we have in store for you at the Global Agile Summit. But if you can't wait, you can go right now to globalagilesummit.com and check out our full schedule for now onto the episode. But I'll see you at the end of this episode with more details on the Global Agile Summit. Talk to you soon. Hello everybody. Welcome to our Friday and DGIF episode, the Proctor episode this week with Tsvane. Hey Tsvane, welcome back.

[Tsvane]

Hi Vasco, Good to be here.

[Vasco]

Absolutely. It's a pleasure to have you here one more time this week to talk about what might be potentially one of the most critical roles in software development today. The product owner role. So let's dive into that. We'll talk about great product owners in a minute. But Svane, first share with us what might have been potentially the worst product owner anti pattern you've witnessed in your career.

[Tsvane]

Thank you Vaska. It's really important topic and important role and this also leads me to a story that I experienced with one product owner that didn't want to be a product owner. So I was working in the team where the product owner was a subject matter expert. He was really one and only expert about the topic that the team was delivering product and what, what he was doing is he was writing down basically the requirements, I would say a kind of, you know, mixed format. It was not, it was not kind of, you know, standard requirements documents up front. But it was more about putting what is in his head in a format that the team can work in a sprint. So, you know, kind of smaller stories kind of story like things. So this was good. So he was really a big expert. What was not good is he didn't want to take the responsibilities of the product owner and he was also external to this organization and he said this is not my role. The organization wanted him to take the role but they didn't push him into this role. So it's a kind of very funny situation. They needed him because of his knowledge and expertise. But they didn't push too hard that he takes this role. What happened is that the system took part of the responsibility of the product owner role. So what?

[Vasco]

And by the system you mean like the team or do you mean something else?

[Tsvane]

Exactly. So the team took part of the. Part of the. Of the responsibilities, like stakeholder communication, like the prioritization. So this part was done by the team and the Scrum Master.

[Vasco]

Okay.

[Tsvane]

Because the prototon I was not doing is so the team, the system needed this. Okay. And it was so obvious that they needed this and they took this responsibility because this person was not taking this responsibility in their.

[Vasco]

And did it work out? Sonnet, did the team and the Scrum Master, were they effectively able to take on those responsibilities and kind of, we could say help out the in name product owner.

[Tsvane]

Exactly. This worked for a while because they were doing this really good. They knew the stakeholders in the organization. They also had the good relationships with the stakeholders from another organization that they needed the input from. So they created this relationships that help them in fulfilling this functionality or these responsibilities of the product on our own.

[Vasco]

Yeah, absolutely. And this can be a very good pattern if it is of course supported by the organization and by us who are helping the teams. Because somebody needs to take those accountabilities. They are there for a reason, but it doesn't need to be one specific person. Right. Like this is why sometimes the proxy PO pattern is a problem and other times it's a great solution. Right. Because it avoids the lack of having a PO present.

[Tsvane]

Exactly, exactly. So what I do usually is have a conversations with the team about the roles and responsibilities to have the clarity who is responsible for what. And this is where there are some things that. Well, there is not clarity, some of the things that they need to do. It's not clear who has to do this. And this is where then the team can define smaller experiments and say, okay, we as a team will take this activity or this responsibility on us, but we will see if this will work for us and then have a kind of conversation, the retrospective. What happened? Is it working for them? And you know what happens with some activities that they think that they need to do but nobody's doing? They don't need them sometimes.

[Vasco]

Yeah, exactly. You know, we need to look at the results. If we're getting the results. Maybe the stuff that is missing isn't necessary after all.

[Tsvane]

Exactly.

[Vasco]

Great point. And of course there are also some amazing product owners out there. So let's explore one of those. SVOne share with us the best product owner you've ever worked with. How did they work?

[Tsvane]

It was a beautiful collaboration with the product owners. So I had one special, special example where the product owner worked with the team for I think more than two years. And I noticed the, you know, like different phases in the development of, of this product owner role. Why am I taking this as example of a great product owner is because this person was changing. This person took feedback from the team and was changing the behavior, changing the way that he was doing things and how he was supporting the team. So one example is the team gave feedback that they didn't have access to him. What does it mean? They had to kind of create, they need to send emails to create scheduled conversations with him. And he was not kind of near the team. He was from the business part of the organization and he was not sitting with the team team. And during this feedback they explained him how important it is to get really timely feedback. Which means that just to talk about, okay, so look, we are finished with this part of the story. Are we going in the right direction? And he understood this and he, he decided to, to sit near the team. Not all the time, but I think it was kind of to two and a half days he was sitting really with the team and we had this really close collaboration. So these small things, how he changed his behavior to help the team to get feedback sooner was a great example for me that he was going to be this great product owner. Also like he was really invested in getting close feedback from the customers and stakeholders. So for me this was a great example of how the discovery works. Let's say at the beginning the discovery work was kind of a bit detached from the team, but during the time he managed to put the discovery activities closer to the team so that the team also took part in some of the activities of the discovery, like creating prototypes, getting feedback from the customers so that they could understand. Ah, so during this interview with the customers, they, they heard the stories and they also saw what is the reaction on some things that they created as a prototype. So they learned a lot about, okay, what do they need to solve for the customer? What are their needs, what are the problems that they have?

[Vasco]

For me, the ability to create that openness is a characteristic of great people anywhere, but definitely for product owners because they are such a critical, they are a linchpin role within software development. And if they are able to be open and listen to the feedback from the team and actually come in and participate, as you said, like, you know, they didn't necessarily move all the time next to the team, but they were there two and a half days a week. And that's more than many people were would do in that context. So that that ability to be open and this is something we can help as Scrum masters, we can help model that openness and also by having those conversations and bringing up the topics in a productive way.

[Tsvane]

Right.

[Vasco]

Like not a you're not doing this but more on, hey, we would really need the help for this or we would benefit if. And that kind of approach. Right?

[Tsvane]

Exactly, Vaska. So it was, it was not trying to kind of pinpoint the things that are not working, but to honor the past and say we need something more, we need something different for the future. And this is where the people are kind of willing to take this kind of risk or experiment to do something different.

[Vasco]

Yeah. And I think it's a really beautiful way to put it. Honor the past, but be clear about what you need differently in the future. Great way to put it. It's funny. Unfortunately, we're getting close to the end. But before we go, if people want to strike up a conversation with you, follow up with you, ask a few more questions, where should they go?

[Tsvane]

Yeah, they should, they should end on the LinkedIn. I think the link is also in the podcast, but even the search for Dudsevic there is one.

[Vasco]

I will put the link in the show notes for sure, make it easy. But people do follow up and ask questions from Svonny. I'm sure he would be happy to engage in conversation. After all, it is like this as a community that we, that we continue to grow as in our practice. Right. As practitioners. Tvan, it's been a pleasure. Thank you very much for your generosity with your time and your knowledge.

[Tsvane]

Thank you, Vasco for being here. It was, it was a great conversation with you, great structuring of the podcast. Thank you. It helped me a lot.

[Vasco]

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