agile roles deep dive

Role Agility

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Table of Contents

1. Product Owner Role

2. Scrum Master Role

3. Solution Lead Role

4. Gearing Ratios

5. Agile Manager Role

6. Product Leadership Team

7. Solution Architect

8. Product Manager

9. Product Mgr vs Product Owner

10. CoPs & Enablement Teams

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Role Agility | Enabling Success for New Roles

3

Team Level

§ Product Owners§ Scrum Masters§ Solution Leads

Team of Teams

§ Product Managers

§ Program Mgrs./RTEs

§ People Managers§ Coaches (Agile,

DevOps, UX/CX)

Portfolio Level

§ Portfolio Owners§ Portfolio Mgrs.§ Business and

Tech Executives§ Enterprise &

Business Agility Strategists



Agile Team Structure

4

Business VisionWhat? Why? What Order?

ProcessFacilitator

Team Backlog

How?

People Manager

Solution Lead

Technical Vision



Product Owner Responsibilities

Responsible for maximizing the business value delivered by the teamØ

Ø Communicates the vision for product and product features to teamØ Collaborates with stakeholders and manages expectations to ensure their most

valuable outcomes are broken down and built into the backlogØ Ensures deliverables/features align to organizational strategies and outcomesØ Supports the team as a subject matter expert representing the businessØ Owns and leads team in prioritizing the “Strategic” backlog based on aligned

value criteriaØ Defines what combination of features can be released and when (fixed time vs

fixed scope)Ø Accepts or rejects work, clarifies acceptance criteriaØ Responsible for preparing stories for future sprints (working closely with BA)Ø Assists team through backlog refinementØ Leads discussion to break down projects to themes, epics, etc.Ø Is readily available to the team to answer questions, attend standup’s, etc.



ScrumMaster

Responsible for facilitating the Scrum process and ensuring the team is delivering value Ø Process facilitator - owns process that creates success

Ø Leads and guides the team - Servant leader

Ø Protects the team from disturbances

Ø Track metrics and communicates overall progress with stakeholders

Ø Manages team growth plan

Ø Coaches individual team members on expectation of their role

Ø Facilitate Sprint planning, execution and reviewing activities with the team

Ø Assesses overall team health and maturity & keeps the pulse of the team

Ø Removes impediments & manages dependencies across teams

Ø Communicates information about team progress to stakeholders

Ø Radiates information to the team to help them make decisions

Ø Coordinates all external team needs (Team of Team Planning, Retros, etc.)

Ø Helps build self-organizing teams and helps the team adapt and inspect their process

Ø Responsible for engaging necessary individuals outside the team



Solution/Tech LeadØ Facilitate the solutioning process with the team and help the team align on the best solution to move

forward withØ Partner with the PO to translate the “What” of the Product Vision into the ”How” of the Technical Vision

Ø Ensures standards are adhered to (tools, languages, development and deployment processes)Ø Mentors others on technical excellence practices such as TDD, clean coding practices, API design and

publishing, performance optimization and other best practices. Ø Understand the different areas of expertise on the team so you can pull the right people into the right

conversationsØ Works to resolve technical impediments ahead of time (looks and plans ahead)Ø Works in the trenches with the Developers to solve problems Leads participatory decision making with the

team to develop and evolve the designØ Represents the team and technology in business meetings and in working with the PO Ø Actively participates in the Center of Excellence or CoP for their role or domainØ Engages system/devops or infrastructure team membersØ Ensures quality through reviews (performs code reviews or pulls in the right people to do reviews)Ø Leads the team in prioritizing and working through the “non-functional” part of the team Backlog



Gearing Ratios – Define YOUR Target Ratios

8

Role/Group Role allocation per team

Scrum Masters 1-2 teams

Product Owners 1-2 teams

Developers/QA/UI 1 team

Solution Lead 1 team

Non Core (shared team members)

DBA, architects, systems, security, network. N teams

# of teams per train 5-8. (max 10)

UX Designer 2-3 per train OR across 2-3 teams

Others?

Exceeding these target ratios causes multi-tasking which leads to decreased FLOW, longer cycle

times, talent burnout and churn.



Agile Managers – Future Role

9

Business VisionWhat? Why?

ProcessFacilitator

Team Backlog

How?

People Manager

Solution Lead

Technical Vision

§ Manage Daily Tasks§ Provide Technical

Solutions§ Shifting Resources§ Coach & Develop

People§ Remove Obstacles§ Develop Talent§ Lead CoP’s§ Form Strong Teams



Team of Teams Level

10

PULL

from

the

Bac

klog

Product Manager

Program Mgr. / RTE

Team of Teams Backlog

System / Solution Architect

StakeholdersEngineering &

Dev Lead

§ Provide Technical Solutions

§ Shifting Resources§ Prioritize enablers§ Define tools, architecture

standards § Tech roadmap§ Remove Obstacles§ Develop Talent§ Support/Form CoP’s

Dev Mgr.Test Mgr.

Analysis Mgr.(Others)

Why create a Product Delivery Team (train, tribe) ?• When a large multi-team product or product line requires overall

leadership and alignment.• When a Portfolio is too large and should be managed in smaller

workstreams and product lines.



Product Leadership Team Jobs to Be Done

11

1. Define/clarify the Business Outcomes desired from this Team of Team group (annual & quarterly).

2. Define the ‘strategic’ initiatives that aligns to the outcomes. Break down high-level Epics into manageable deliverables or themes.

3. Define and follow an effective value scoring/prioritization process for new intake so that teams are always working on the highest priorities.

4. Ensure an effective discovery team and process is established with the right user/customer engagement.

5. Develop and communicates to teams a product roadmap.6. Schedule and execute quarterly team of team planning sessions, demos and

retrospectives. Ensure the overall health and engagement of these sessions. 7. Manage capacity/demand, cost and dependencies across teams. 8. Manage and maintain the reporting and tracking tools & metrics.9. Create an obstacle/organizational growth item backlog solicited from the teams.



Solution Architect

} Focuses on areas of architectural significance – e.g., interfaces, layering, major system components, frameworks…

} Leads participatory decision making with the team to develop and evolve the architecture} Leads Architecture Center of Excellence (CoE)} Final decision-making authority when it comes to the architecture & design} Ensures the team properly documents the architecture and design} Infuses guidance from outside the team into the technical solution (company standards & vision)} Conduit for using team experiences to re-shape company technical standards and technical vision} Actively oversees translation of technical vision through the whole SDLC } Help teams decide how to make the proper tradeoffs between project’s functional requirements,

non-functional requirements, and the project’s constraints} Is available to assist with teams when needed} …

12

System / Solution Architect



Engineering/Dev Lead

} Leads the ‘People’ side of the delivery including the People Managers

} Ensures the teams have the right people, skills, tools and capacity need to deliver successfully

} Focuses on areas in technology that need cross-team decision making and support

} Tracks and optimizes the technology spend (tools, users, hardware, people) against budget

} Leads technology group in identifying and implementing appropriate development tools,

standards, guidelines, best practices.

} Leads or Co-Leads the Technical Excellence Community of Practice

} Involved in the hiring and on-boarding of new engineers

} Infuses guidance from outside the team into the technical solution (company standards & vision)

} Actively engaged with Solution Architect in translation of technical vision through the whole

SDLC

} …

13

Engineering/Dev Lead



Product ManagerResponsible for maximizing the business value delivered by teamsØ Understands, aligns and communicates the desired business outcomes to the teamsØ Understand customer needs and pain points (voice of the customer)Ø Set product strategy, vision and long-term product direction along with portfolio leadersØ Develop and communicate the Product roadmap yearly and quarterly Ø Works one quarter or PI ahead of the teamsØ Build Discovery Team and lead Discovery processes and experiments (test it, nail it, scale it) Ø Help define releases and/or Program Increments & prioritize features in preparation for Release or

PI planningØ Measure product success (ex: AARRR Pirate Metrics)Ø Actively participates and presents vision, outcomes and progress with the teams during PI planning

and demo ceremonies Ø Build an effective team of Product Owners. Provide mentoring and coaching as neededØ Hold weekly or bi-weekly Product Sync meetings to coordinate cross-team prioritization, idea

sharing and ensure consistency across teams

Product Manager



Product Managers vs Product Owners

15

§ 20% Tactical / 80% Strategic§ Own the Vision & Product Roadmap§ Prioritize the Product Backlog§ Align Teams to Outcomes§ Guide and Align Product Owners§ Lead Discovery Efforts§ Track & Optimize Feature Delivery§ Engages with Stakeholders & Users (voice of the customer)

§ 80% Tactical / 20% Strategic§ Own the “What” & “Why”§ Rank the Backlog§ Accept / Reject Work§ Align Teams to Value & Outcomes§ Ensure Team Health & Celebrate Success

Product Owner

Product Owner



Product Management Competencies

16

Deliv

ery

§ Enable Focus

§ Clarity of Priorities

§ Backlog Management

§ Stakeholder Engagement

§ Acceptance & Validation

Disc

over

y § Discovery Team

§ Discovery Process

§ Problem & Solution Validation

§ Customer Engagement

Visio

n &

Stra

tegy

§ Customer Focus

§ Business outcomes

§ Strategy Planning

§ Roadmap Planning

§ Quarterly Planning

§ Iteration Planning

Lead

ersh

ip

§ Problem Solver

§ Model Desired Culture

§ Negotiation Skills

§ Effective Facilitator

§ Effective Communication

Valu

e Dl

iery § Quality

§ Time to Market

§ Outcome Delivery

§ Customer Satisfaction https://agilityhealthradar.com/product-owner-health-radar-assessment/


https://agilityhealthradar.com/product-owner-health-radar-assessment/


Why Create CoP & Enablement Teams?

17

CoP and Enablement Teams are key enablers to “Go Wide” Agility adoption efforts, particularly where consistent, aligned practices are important and accelerated Knowledge Transfer is a key to success…



Communities of Practice vs. Enablement Teams

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CoP’s Enablement Team§ Standards and best practices§ Knowledge sharing, coaching,

mentorship§ Tools, Wiki § Common frameworks§ Education & learning§ Alignment / Governance§ Sponsored by managers but

facilitated by team members

§ Purpose is to enable existing stable teams with key skills such as (DevOps, Agile, CX)

§ Embed with the team to provide coaching/training

§ Provide templates, tools, best practices

§ Success is measured when the team learns the new skills and can apply them



Communities of Practice

Guidelines for good CoPs:

• Led by a respected content expert of leader

• Establish a Charter for purpose, goals, cadence.

• Group prioritizes backlog of topics, activities, etc.

• Sub-groups often needed for large CoPs (15-20 participants)

Agile Coaching

CoP

Best Practices

Peer Mentorship

Coach Growth & Develop-

ment

Templates and Cheat

Sheets

Shadowing

Knowledge Wiki



Enablement Teams

§ Enable other agile teams with critical but limited skills (DevOps, CX, Leadership, Financial Analytics…)

§ Provide templates, tools, best practices, coaching & training§ Temporarily embed with teams to mentor new skills

20

Baseline Assessment

Create a Skills Growth

Backlog

Provide Tools & Best

Practices

Mentor & Coach Team

Enable Self-Learning

Re-assess & Update Backlog


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