Why "I'll Just Do It Myself" Is the Most Expensive PO Shortcut | Juliana Stepanova

Summary

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Podcast Summary

Podcast: Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast
Host: Vasco Duarte
Guest: Juliana Stepanova (Agile Coach and Scrum Master)
Episode: Why "I'll Just Do It Myself" Is the Most Expensive PO Shortcut
Date: February 6, 2026

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Episode Overview

This episode centers on common Product Owner (PO) anti-patterns, focusing particularly on the dangers and costs of a PO taking on too many roles or responsibilities under the guise of speed or efficiency—summarized as the “I’ll Just Do It Myself” shortcut. Through Juliana Stepanova's experience, the discussion explores why collaborative work is fundamental to Agile, how to address the temptation to go solo, and the marks of truly effective product ownership.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. The Most Expensive PO Anti-Pattern: "I'll Just Do It Myself"

• Juliana identifies the most prevalent anti-pattern as the Product Owner stepping outside their role and taking over other responsibilities, such as design or testing, in an attempt to accelerate progress.
• She shares that this shortcut often results in:
  • Neglected collaboration and reduced team synergy
  • Work needing to be redone, negating any time saved
  • Disrespect for the specialized skills of others on the team (e.g., designers, testers)
  • Breakdown of responsibility and long-term team dysfunction

Notable quote:

“For me, like most spreaded anti pattern [is] to make it quicker: I will be just like skipping the designer. ...I learned somehow like 5 years ago how it's designed. I will put it...”
— Juliana Stepanova [01:51]

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2. Why Collaboration is Essential to Agile

• Vasco highlights that collaboration is at Agile's core, and isolated work circumvents the value of leveraging diverse perspectives.
• Juliana expands:
  • Taking over others’ jobs (e.g., a developer testing instead of the tester) can appear to be a short-term gain but erodes long-term effectiveness and communication.
  • When people cover for absent roles, important accountability and cross-team communication suffer.

Notable quote:

“If developer can test the user story it doesn’t mean that he should do it or she should do it and passing by the tester... It’s the quick win on the very short term solution. If we take it as well in the long term it’s breaking the whole system...”
— Juliana Stepanova [04:35]

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3. Building Respect, Communication, and Professionalism

• Juliana stresses the importance of professional boundaries and respect for each role’s unique contributions.
• She teaches teams to:
  • Appreciate the value others bring (“they’re making really great brilliant job” about UX/UI designers)
  • Maintain effective communication even during bottlenecks, asking before stepping in (“Do you need the help in this bottleneck situation?”)
  • Only fill gaps when explicitly requested, focusing otherwise on one’s own role

Notable quote:

“It's really like showing not respectful in the regarding to the UX/UI... In my case, I would wait if they ask me for the help. Or I can ask, ‘Do you need the help?’”
— Juliana Stepanova [06:11]

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4. Recognizing and Intervening Early in the "Loner" Pattern

• Vasco notes it’s crucial for Scrum Masters to observe early signs of people trying to "do it all themselves" and use these moments to spark open conversations about collaboration.

“That should be the trigger to have a conversation...”
— Vasco Duarte [07:06]

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5. Profile of Outstanding Product Owners

• Juliana describes the best POs as those who:
  • Are committed to growth and learning
  • Openly communicate challenges and inefficiencies with the team, rather than solving them alone
  • Invite the team to co-create solutions

Example Story:

One PO faced a recurring wasteful release process meeting. Instead of enduring it or unilaterally solving it, the PO brought the issue to the team and Scrum Master. Collectively, they devised a more efficient, semi-automatic release process, eliminating unnecessary meetings and waste—eventually spreading this improvement company-wide.

Notable quote:

“The PO who’s not like sitting and saying I’m knowing how it’s right, I will deal by myself, I will solve it. But coming and saying hey let’s sync all together, it’s given a very, very speed up development to the great PO. This really communication to be open…”
— Juliana Stepanova [09:30]

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6. Team-Centric Success and Shared Responsibility

• Vasco wraps up: True delivery happens via the team, not by a lone PO regardless of talent. Shared achievement, transparency, and team-driven problem solving are hallmarks of high-performing Agile teams.

Notable quote:

"The PO may be a genius, but they can’t deliver the software. The whole team needs to collaborate on that..."
— Vasco Duarte [10:00]

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Memorable Quotes and Timestamps

• On spreading anti-patterns:
  “For me, like most spreaded anti pattern [is] to make it quicker: I will be just like skipping the designer…”
  [01:51] Juliana Stepanova

• On damaging efficiency for collaboration:
  “If developer can test the user story it doesn’t mean that he should do it…In the long term it’s breaking the whole system…”
  [04:35] Juliana Stepanova

• On respect for specialist roles:
  “It's really like showing not respectful in the regarding to the UX/UI and they're making really great brilliant job...I would wait if they ask me for the help.”
  [06:11] Juliana Stepanova

• On high-performing POs:
  "The PO who’s...not sitting and saying I’m knowing how it’s right, I will deal by myself...but coming and saying hey let’s sync all together, it’s given a very, very speed up development to the great PO..."
  [09:30] Juliana Stepanova

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Additional Resources

• Juliana mentions listeners can connect with her via LinkedIn, inviting questions from the Agile community.
  [10:40]

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Summary Table of Key Segments

| Timestamp | Segment | |-----------|-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | 01:51 | Juliana discusses the "I'll just do it myself" anti-pattern | | 04:35 | Dangers of role-blurring and lack of specialization | | 06:11 | Importance of respect, asking before stepping into other roles | | 07:32 | What great POs do differently | | 09:30 | Team story: group solution to release process inefficiency | | 10:40 | Contact information for Juliana and invitation for further questions |

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Takeaways

• The shortcut of “just doing it myself” is rarely faster when viewed holistically—long-term consequences include wasted effort and team dysfunction.
• Respect, open communication, and recognition of each team member’s expertise form the heart of effective Agile collaboration.
• High-performing Product Owners grow with the team, seek diverse input, and prioritize team outcomes over individual heroics.

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Transcript

[A]

Hey there, agile adventurer, just a quick question. What if, for the price of a fancy coffee or half a pizza, you could unlock over 700 hours of the best agile content on the planet? That's audio, video, E courses, books, presentations, all that you can think of. But you can also join live calls with world class practitioners and hang out in a flame war free and AI slop clean slack with the sharpest minds in the game. Oh, and yes, you get direct access to me, Vasko, your Scrum Master Toolbox podcast. No, this is not a drill. It's this Scrum Master Toolbox membership. And it's your unfair advantage in the agile world. So if you want to know more, go check out scrummastertoolbox.org membership. That's scrummastertoolbox.org Membership. And check out all the goodies we have for you. Do it now. But if you're not doing it now, let's listen to the podcast. Hello everybody. Welcome to our product owner TGIF episode here on the Scrum Master Toolbox podcast. And this week we have with us Juliana Stepanova. Hey Juliana, welcome back.

[B]

Hello.

[A]

So product owner is the focus for today and of course we know there are some amazing product owners out there and we'll explore what that looks and sounds and feels like in a minute. But first we of course need to explore some of the anti patterns. So Juliana, share with us what might have been potentially the worst product owner anti pattern you've witnessed in your career.

[B]

Interesting question because I'm not measuring how worse or how bad are the anti patterns but actually what comes to my mind it's anti pattern when PO takes another job, for example the designer job or another role. And this is like something that I see a lot and I would say it's for me like most spreaded anti pattern like to make it quicker. I will be just like skipping the designer. So we have UX UI in the team but I will skip to asking to clarify, I will directly put it by myself. I I Learned somehow like 5 years ago how it's designed. I will put it and what is actually the problem. Then afterwards it's like neglecting or not not taking into account the whole team. Busy week and actually you need to rework and this is like classical so additionally like one more it's anti pattern but it's like really crucial I would say when the PO communicating into the team the information in different way or with different meaning to the team. But actually it's, it's not about anti pattern or not about po, it's about the person who are transferring the information. So it's like something that I really saw only once and it was solved in very quick way, but when the information flow broke in some way, it's like catastrophic for the team.

[A]

Yeah, I want to focus on the first one because this is a very interesting one. The loner, right? Like the person who wants to do everything on their own because it's just faster and I've done it before. And I want to focus on this specifically because it counters one of the core aspects of agility, which is that value emerges from collaboration between different people. And it can only emerge from collaboration because everybody brings a different perspective into the decision making. When you work with this type of product owners, what are some of the practices or techniques that you've learned that help these product owners to understand that creating software is actually a collaborative process, that it cannot be done by just having one person geniusly thinking about all the perfect solutions.

[B]

In this way I work not only with the PO, but with the whole team because this behavior as well. So this anti pattern not coming only about the po. So it's happened as well in the team and here my main focus is to see the value of your work and to make it in professional way and support to have a that work done by the specific person. So for example, if developer can test the user story it doesn't mean that he should do it or she should do it and passing by the tester. If we have specially dedicated tester and taking their jobs because it's the quick win on the very short term solution. If we take it as well in the long term it's breaking the whole system because if the person is in the location. So if for example tests are in the vacation and developers taking over their responsibility then it come afterwards into the failure where something goes wrong. The responsibility, shared responsibility as well not coming into the place and communication will not work at all. And in this case like growing up, the value of communication, openness and to encourage taking responsibility of your own work, it's help a lot and as well respect to other jobs. Because if I will say at the Scrum Master, hey, I have a designer course like a year ago. I can do it for you quickly. It's really like showing not respectful in the regarding to the UX UI and they're making really great brilliant job. So in my case I would wait if they ask me for the help. Or I can ask do you need the help? In this bottleneck situation I could prob Be useful or otherwise, I will focus on my job. And this is like one of the setup I mostly bring to the team with a respect, communication and professional relation to your particular role.

[A]

Yeah, absolutely. All of that. And also paying attention to when people start going in this loner direction. Right. Because that's important. That should be the trigger to have a conversation. And of course these anti patterns do happen and we need to be ready for them. But there are also some amazing product owners out there. Juliana. So the best product owner you've ever worked with, how did they work?

[B]

I have not only one, so really I have amazing pos. And most of the pos are the person who really would like to grow in their role. So they are patient to it. So they probably starting with like bad PO position or anti patterns but with an iteration with time with over the time they are growing up. I would tell taking like one of as an example, we have an EPO who really communicates the challenges outside the team. For example release process. So the risk process. He was invited in some meeting to present and do so on. And afterwards it took time and it was really like waste of the time. And the PO asked the team hey guys, I have these meetings, I don't know each second week and it's take about one and a half, two hours and it's useless for me how we can deal with that. And then altogether me the scrum master on the both level the team we search for solutions not only one but like in a bunch of different options. And when we deal this problem altogether it solved very quickly. At the end we end up with a straight format semi automatic system for release improvement in 10 minutes without meetings, without taking 30 person in one room. And then as a first team who experiment with it and it was really great, we introduced it for all over the company. So we reduce a bunch of meetings time and waste. And in this way the PO who's not like sitting and saying I'm knowing how it's right, I will deal by myself, I will solve it. But coming and saying hey let's sync all together it's given a very very speed up development to the great po. This really communication to be open for solution to not sit in or put in your as a PO as the highest person but be the part of the team.

[A]

Yeah, that's a great point to highlight right? Like when the PO really feels part of the team and that they share on the success of the team. Because at the end of the day in software teams it's the teams that Deliver the software. The PO may be a genius, but they can't deliver the software. The whole team needs to collaborate on that. And I really like the story of the PO being open to the team, contributing what they want to work on and what the things are that they struggle with and figuring out how to solve it. Right. So that's a great example. Juliana, it was a pleasure to have you with us this week. We're about to go, but before we do, where can people find out more about you and the work that you're doing?

[B]

So actually I have LinkedIn, so you can follow me there or look there and I will send the link. So welcome on my page.

[A]

Absolutely.

[B]

And feel free to ask questions. I'm open and I'm really engaged to communicate with other Scrum Master PO or people passion to Agile.

[A]

Absolutely. And we'll put the link to the show Notes. So why not engage with Juliana, ask follow up questions. I'm sure there are many possible followers follow up questions from this episode. Juliana, it was a pleasure. Thank you very much for your generosity with your time and your knowledge.

[B]

Thank you very much. It was a really interesting and as well powerful podcast for me to remind what is actually the work of the Scrum Master, what challenges we have. And I'm still loving Agile and I will never switch from the Scrum Master Agile work.

[A]

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