As the manager of the Product Owner, what would you do?

You are an Agile Leader managing a few Scrum Teams and responsible for the success of their products. A sales executive needs a specific feature to be added to the product to sign a deal with one of her customers, but the Product Owner (who reports to you) analyzed the request and believes that there are more valuable items on the Product Backlog that will lead to more long-term value to the business. Disappointed, the sales executive comes to you asking you to intervene.

As the manager of the Product Owner, what would you do?
A . Let the Product Owner understand that the scope of the Product is negotiable, feedback is essential and he must welcome changes in requirements even late in development.
B. Support the Product Owners decision.
C. Ask the Product Owner to implement the feature to sign the deal.
D. As a manager, ask directly the Developers to implement the feature.

View Answer

Answer: B

Explanation:

For the Product Owner to succeed, the entire organization must respect his or her decisions. The Product Owner is responsible for maximizing the value of the product resulting from the work of the Developers. Although the Agile Manifesto says "Welcome changing requirements, even late in development", the Product Owner has already evaluated the request along with other Product Backlog items to maximize the value. If the sales executive provides very important proof of value and you feel the Product Owner may not have evaluated the value of the request, you may ask the Product Owner or facilitate a meeting to let the Product Owner review it, but respect and support the Product Owner’s decision.