Mastering the Product Owner Stances

Professional Scrum Product Owner™ – Advanced (PSPO-A) is a hands-on, activity-based course that focuses on helping experienced Product Owners and Product Managers expand their ability to establish a vision, validate their hypotheses, and ultimately deliver more value to their stakeholders. The course goes beyond the topics explored in the Professional Scrum Product Owner (PSPO) class by deepening the attendee’s understanding of the role through the exploration of the many stances of a professional Product Owner.

Students should have at least one year of Product Owner experience and a practical knowledge of Scrum in order to participate in and benefit from these exercises. Having previously taken the PSPO class is recommended, but not required.

The course also includes a free attempt at the globally recognized Professional Scrum Product Owner II (PSPO II) certification exam.

Course Overview

In this two day class* students will gain a better understanding of what it means to deliver value and how to express that value inside and outside of their organization. Through a case study-based series of exercises, combined with instruction, students gain the entrepreneurial product leadership skills and practices critical to growing as a successful Product Owner.

The Product Owner role is multifaceted, requiring them to engage in behaviors and adopt mindsets beyond the core of Agility and the Scrum framework. Students explore these techniques and how to pivot among them by exploring several Product Owner “stances” including:

• The Customer Representative:
  • Focus on understanding customer problems, pains and opportunities
  • Get into the mindset of the customer, placing yourself in their world, understanding their needs
  • Deliver value by connecting product features to customer outcomes
• The Visionary:
  • Champion the future state, possibilities, goals and chances
  • Communicate the product vision, strategy and Product Goal
  • Understand value and pricing models
• The Experimenter:
  • Focus on innovation through experiments, hypotheses, tests, learnings, data and validation of value
  • Understand the Product Owner’s role in a scaled environment
• The Decision Maker:
  • Focus on making better decisions
  • Navigate conflicting customer feedback
• The Collaborator:
  • Seek collaboration with stakeholders and the Scrum Team
  • Work beyond the Scrum Team including contracts, finance, budgeting and governance in an agile way
• The Influencer:
  • Lead the stakeholders, customers and Scrum Team, to move in the right direction and to change their minds, when necessary
  • Learn how to create a stakeholder management strategy

View the different Focus Areas covered within this class and others.

* When offered in-person, this course is generally delivered over two consecutive days. When offered as a Live Virtual Class, the course may be broken up into more, shorter days.

Course Learning Objectives

• Experienced Product Owners will learn different stances a Product Owner takes in order to navigate everyday challenges
• Modern complementary practices will be introduced through discussions, case studies and exercises
• Students will leave with a clear understanding of Agile Product Management as they continue on their Product Owner journey
• Learn about the various types of stakeholders that Product Owners represent and how to best work with them.

Who Should Attend this class?

This course is designed for Product Owners, Product Managers, and Business Analysts focusing heavily on Product Management skills, tools, techniques, and knowledge as part of their work on the Scrum Team. The course does not address the Scrum framework (much), and we assume people have a proper understanding of the Scrum framework. Participants should have at least one year of experience as a Product Owner or Product Manager, while multiple years of experience and having attended the Professional Scrum Product Owner course and passing PSPO is preferred, but not mandatory.

Other people that might benefit from the PSPO-A course include:

• Scrum Masters / Agile Coaches
• Company leaders

Course Topics

• Understanding your products
• Who are your customers?
• Connecting product features to customer outcomes
• Communicating the product vision and strategy
• Value and pricing models
• Innovation and experimentation
• Stakeholders and stakeholder management
• Agile governance, budgeting and contracting in relation to Scrum
• Scaling the Product Owner role

Professional Scrum Certification

All participants completing the Professional Scrum Product Owner – Advanced course will receive a password to attempt the Professional Scrum Product Owner II (PSPO II) assessment. The industry-recognized PSPO II certification requires a minimum passing score of 85%. PSPO-A class participants who attempt the PSPO II assessment within 14 days of receiving their free password and do not score at least 85% will be granted a second attempt at no additional cost.

You are also entitled to a discount on the PSPO III assessment.

PMI PDU Credits

Students of Scrum.org courses are able to claim Project Management Institute (PMI) PDU credit: 14 PDUs after attending a two-day  Professional Scrum Product Owner – Advanced (PSPO-A) course. Please note that PMI PDUs are earned for course attendance and not for passing a Scrum.org assessment. Students can claim PDUs under PMI’s “Education courses provided by other third party providers” category. You can claim your PDUs online at https://ccrs.pmi.org.  Find instructions here.

Schedule and Logistics

• Training will be online and begin at 9:30 AM sharp and will end around 4:00 PM on all 3 days. There will be a lunch break. (All times US Central)
• Students should login 5-10 minutes prior to start of each session to work through any technical issues.
• All students should be able to use Zoom and Mural to participate in the training.

Participation Agreement

• All students must complete the prework by the deadline to join the class.
• All students must behave in alignment with the working agreement co-created by all students in class.
• All students should keep their cameras turned on throughout the training.
• Any student who misses more than 30 minutes of the training will neither receive the certificate of course participation nor will they receive the free password for taking the assessment.

Benefits of PSPO-A

• Understanding the mind-set of an entrepreneurial Product Owner

• Communicating an inspiring and compelling Product Vision to Teams

• Creating a powerful Product Strategy to realize the vision

• Practicing tactics of Product Ownership to execute on the Product Strategy

• Continuously learn and improve using Evidence Based Management EBMgt ™

What Next?

SmoothApps offers the following additional training courses, which are available publicly and privately.

• Professional Scrum Foundations
• Professional Scrum Master
• Professional Scrum Developer
• Scaled Professional Scrum