The Art of Agile Product Ownership: A Guide for Product Managers, Business Analysts, and Entrepreneurs

Product Information

High-performing organizations use DevOps to dramatically outperform competitors by delivering and supporting their products and services to respond to customer demands faster. In this example, a mobile banking solution is delivered to external customers by a Mobile Banking Product Manager. The mobile banking app is built on a secure, compliant e-banking platform provided by a Digital Platform Product Manager. The core banking platform is built on scalable cloud infrastructure delivered by a Cloud Product Manager. Each oversees a solution that delivers a valuable product or service that is either consumed or further enhanced by the immediate customer. This scenario is especially common in the development of Large Solutions. System Architect/Engineering is an individual or team that defines the overall architecture of the system. They work at a level of abstraction above the teams and components and define Nonfunctional Requirements (NFRs), major system elements, subsystems, and interfaces. Customer centricity and design thinking comprise the first dimension of APD. This mindset and way of doing business put the customer first, at the enterprise’s core, to provide positive customer experiences and build long-term relationships. Customer Centricity Release Train Engineer (RTE) is a servant leader who facilitates program execution, impediment removal, risk and dependency management, and continuous improvement.

Deliver – Produces various artifacts that are suitable for creating the solution. These solutions often start as prototypes with continuous delivery from the ARTs. System Teams typically assist in building and maintaining development, continuous integration, and test environments. Learn describes the practices needed to decide what should be done with the information gathered and prepare for the next learning loop through the CDPA new system increment every two weeks – Each train delivers a new system increment every two weeks. The System Demo provides a mechanism for evaluating the working system, which is an integrated increment from all the teams.

Each of these areas of responsibility is described in the sections below. Connecting with the Customer Product Management is the function responsible for defining desirable, viable, feasible, and sustainable solutions that meet customer needs and supporting development across the product life cycle. Stream-aligned team – organized around the flow of work and has the ability to deliver value directly to the customer or end user. The ever-expanding universe of cloud capabilities has fundamentally changed how digitally enabled solutions are built, deployed, and maintained. Cloud computing has been one of the most disruptive drivers for changing the delivery model for enterprise IT since its inception. Not surprisingly, the primary reason to move to the cloud is to increase product development speed and agility.

Define the ART

Building and maintaining a Continuous Delivery Pipeline (CDP) allows each ART to define, build, validate, and release new functionality to meet their PI objectives. DevOps and the Continuous Delivery Pipeline

Product Management requires a deep understanding of the customer. Customers determine the value of every solution and, thus, are an integral part of the Lean-Agile development process. Identify market rhythms and events – Market rhythms are predictable, often seasonal, patterns in supply and demand that inform periodic release schedules. Market events, such as regulatory changes, patent expirations, and releases from competitors, occur more sporadically and require Product Management to plan for dynamic, out-of-cycle releases.

Continuous Integration builds quality into the development process by continuously integrating many Agile Teams’ work. Releasing on demand provides a significant strategic advantage by making value available when customers, the market, and the business need it. In collaboration with stakeholders, Product Management determines when a release should happen, what elements should be released, and who should receive it. For most enterprises moving to Agile, this is a new–and typically full-time–role for each Agile Team. Each PO represents the needs of customers and the business within a particular Solution domain, typically co-represented by a Product Manager. Together, they ensure that product strategy and implementation remain connected throughout the value stream.

Flow through the system is visualized, managed, and measured by the Program Kanban. ARTs Deliver All or Part of a Value Stream Enabling team – organized to assist other teams with specialized capabilities and help them become proficient in new technologies. Some products serve market segments that offer new functionality as soon as it’s available. While others may have distinct market rhythms that govern optimal release windows, as described in the Roadmap article. Agile Teams – Agile Teams embrace the ‘Agile Manifesto’ and SAFe Core Values and Principles. They apply Scrum, Extreme Programming (XP), Kanban, and other Built-In Quality practices. It is common for product managers throughout the organization to work together in developing a final solution that is composed of several integrated solutions (Figure 4). Figure 4. Teams of Product Managers working together to create a solutionThe organization of an ART determines who will plan and work together, as well as what products, services, features, or components the train will deliver. Organizing ARTs is part of the ‘art’ of SAFe. This process is covered extensively in the Implementation Roadmap article series, particularly in ‘ Identify Value Streams and ARTs‘ and ‘ Create the Implementation Plan.’ Measurement– Supports learning and continuous improvement by understanding and measuring the flow of value through the pipeline. Develop on Cadence, Release on Demand – ARTs apply cadence and synchronization to help manage the inherent variability of research and development. However, releasing is typically decoupled from the development cadence. ARTs can release a solution, or elements of a solution, at any time, subject to governance and release criteria. To simplify this job of team design, SAFe applies four fundamental team topologies [1] which are defined as follows: Cadence and synchronization assure that the focus is continuously on the evolution and objective assessment of the full system, rather than its elements. The system demo, which occurs at the end of every iteration, provides the objective evidence that the system is iterating. ART Execution, DevOps, and Continuous Delivery