Productowner Podcasts

How do you know that something will work ahead of time? What problems will come up when a customer uses your product? When can you double down on something that works? A simple way to handle those questions is to keep your options open. Then when you get new info, you have the ability to react intelligently. Feedback: twitter - @deliveritcast email…

How many discussions, debates, or other conversations do we get stuck in over practices and tools? What would happen if instead, we focused on the principles that those things are supposed to enable for us? In this episode, a review of some principles from different disciplines and areas that we can use to guide us. Which do you use already? Feedba…

There seems to be something magical about the number 3. It appears to show up in many different places and in lots of useful ways. This episode examines a "Rule of 3" for the things we do in product, agile, and personal things. There are several other fields that have a similar structure, so why not for us as well? Feedback: twitter - @deliveritcas…

More Metrics! Which ones are the most important ones for people that are at the top levels of your company? What areas do they care about to decide if investing more is worth it? In this episode, Stephanie Tanzar talks about the 3 that are leading the way to better outcomes in product-led organizations, and why they are becoming more relevant to bo…

Exploring an idea around the 3rd root cause of failures I've seen in working in a more agile way, incentives. Many times, if the behavior and reasons don't make sense to you, take a look at how the person is being rewarded, or the lack of rewards, and see if you can understand it better. This can also be the secret key to changing how people work, …

A reminder that *the* most important word for a Product Owner, is "No." There are so many different ways, places, and people that need to be told no that can really be difficult. What about if someone tells you no as well? Revisiting the idea of all the different times, reasons, and ideas that Product Owners can use to say no successfully with gues…

How often do Product Owners find themselves telling stories? Stories about our customers, teams, and problems faced by both. In this episode, I wanted to share some things I've been reading that help to understand how to listen, gather, and tell better stories. If you are interested in seeing how the best storytellers refine their craft and how PO'…

Sometimes you find a way to hack a problem so well, that it affects most other things you do as well. In this episode, I share a hack I tried out recently and changed my mindset about a lot of things, work-related and beyond. If you are struggling with planning, thinking, or executing something, try using a budget for it and see what happens. Feedb…

What are some of the habits that product people have? After reading two books on habits recently, that thought kept coming up. This episode goes into the idea of Product Habits, those things that we do with our teams, customers, company, products, and ourselves. Andrew Stokzko joins the show to discuss his ideas and experience. Got a good or bad ha…

There are lots of questions about certification and training for Product Owners. In this episode, we talk to scrum trainers Todd Miller and Ryan Ripley to understand what PO's should know before they attend any training. If you are looking to take a class or get your certification, what should you read, watch, and do ahead of the class. We also dis…

More and more places seem to want to run some form of "Hybrid" model of agile and waterfall together. What does that look like in practice and how can a Product Owner survive? Is it possible to make this work, or should you abandon all hope if you start hearing this word a lot? In this episode, you'll learn what most places mean by hybrid and some …

Product Owners frequently encounter Agile Coaches in our day-to-day work and some of their tools and techniques can be valuable to us. In this episode, Bob Galen joins the show to chat about what ideas PO's can adapt, borrow, or use that coaches do exceptionally well that can help us to improve our work. If you worked with a coach and carried forwa…

No matter what method, framework, or practice you are using as a Product Nerd to break down your work, it all comes back to "what" and "how". At least that is what Alyssa Knoll's "Theory of Everything" says and for this episode, she joins the show to discuss the idea, the post she wrote detailing it, and some things that she's learned since then. W…

All too often what some PO's and teams call an "Iteration", is anything but. Seeing that far too often, this episode explores some of the reasons why and ways to iterate with our teams, products, practices, and selves. Got any tips or tricks to make sure that you are iterating towards success? Feedback: twitter - @deliveritcast email - deliveritcas…

The language that Product Owners use every day plays a big role in how successful our products, teams, and customers will be, not to mention, ourselves. How do we change that language? In his wonderful books, David Marquet explores how he successfully used "Intent" as the driver of change on his submarine and when working in other areas as well. In…

Product owners see and deal with a lot of waste. It's almost everywhere. In our products, our process, our teams, our daily lives. The struggle is not only in how to eliminate or at least reduce the waste, it's how to get others to know and look for the waste as well. In this episode we will look at what are the 8 wastes from a Lean perspective and…

Have you ever been told you're a perfectionist? Is that really common for Product Owners? Is perfection even possible? In this episode, Geoff Watts joins the show to talk about how this is a trait that can sometimes trap us in our work and with our teams. Also, we discuss some areas where it might be a good thing and how POs can leverage it for a b…

The simple questions are usually the best. In this episode, I share a question ( or series of questions ) that has been driving a lot of my conversations lately to understand some of the fundamental thinking in companies. Sometimes this reveals things that aren't great and can give a direction for PO's to head in to make things better. Feedback: tw…

What is it about measurements that cause so much grief? There's a great number of things that we should be measuring in our product, our teams, and our companies that would benefit us to look at. Product Owners need to be in a position to help see, understand, and explain all the different things that are being measured. If important things are not…

A common anti-pattern is when Product Owners are too focused on doing things only in the current iteration. Maarten Dalmijn has written a lot about teams and PO's that find themselves stuck in their sprint bubble and joins this episode to discuss some signs that you're stuck, some ideas to break out, and ways to make sure sure you don't find yourse…

In this episode, you can hear a chat with Vitalik Demin the Chief of Product at Gossip, a voice-based social network app about how he became involved in the startup and how they are approaching all things product there. It's a great chance to hear how small start-ups get their initial product experiments and learnings done quickly, and what issues …

Product Owners will have the most success working with well-formed and happy teams. Creating those teams requires a lot of people working together and figuring out how best to enable them to succeed. Teams and the thinking around them have evolved in the last few years so in this episode there's some new information, some common challenges, and sug…

Occasionally as a Product Owner, we'll get stuck trying to decide something. How to write a story, come up with a goal, or see when things need to happen. We are stuck trying to look forward into an unknown future. One way to change the outlook on something is to reverse it and start at the end. The reasons why you might want to do that and what yo…

So often the amount of success that Product Owners will have is dependent upon the organization they work in. How they are built, what they value, how they lead and treat their teams and individuals. In this episode, the amazing author of "Empowered: Ordinary People, Extraordinary Result" Marty Cagan joins the show to discuss some of the ideas in t…

Such a simple and fundamental question. What do customers want? How much time and energy do we spend on this most important of topics. Tony Ulwick has been thinking about that very thing for a long time, and written several books about it. In this episode Tony joins to show to talk a bit about how deretmining what those customers needs are is the k…