Hey! What's up everybody welcome back to my channel. Joshua Partogi here. So before
we start today's video, I would like to give everyone a massive thank you for
all of the support that you have given me either directly sent to my email or
all of that kind comments on social media, all of the likes, all of the shares,
and especially for those of you who already subscribed to my channel. Your
support really motivates me to continuously improve in the future.
Initially I started my own YouTube channel just to improve my creativity as
a Scrum Master as it is important for the Scrum Master to be creative. I didn't
realised that a lot of people actually found values in my vlogs. So thank you
once again and let's start today's video.
So in today's video I would like to discuss about the differences between
project manager and Product Owner. This topic was requested by Dejan Majkic
on my previous video about project manager versus Scrum Master. So if you're
also interested to know about the differences between project manager and
Product Owner, don't go anywhere stay on this video.
So everytime I get this kind of question in my Professional Scrum Product Owner (PSPO)
classes I would flash up a two parts exercise because the term project
manager and product owner consists of two words. So in the first part of the
exercise, I asked participants to compare project versus product and in the second
part of the exercise I asked participants to compare manager versus owner. On the
first part of the exercise, I asked participants to write down on as many
sticky notes as possible all of the attributes of great projects and also
all of the attributes of great products. This exercise was inspired by another
Professional Scrum Trainer (PST) named Kate Terlecka. Until today, the participants
in my classes said that in general the attributes of great projects is
delivered on time, on scope and on budget. Great projects also have great teamwork
and synergy. And lastly, great project managers who expertly manage the project.
On the other hand, great products are user friendly, have responsive speed,
addictive, and also solve the customer problems. They said this is the
fundamental attribute for great products. Beyond the fundamental attributes, great
products not only solve customer problems but also make customers more
awesome. Great products can even transform a customer's life. And even
greater than that, great products can be a legacy that is passed down to the next
generation. According to Project Management Institute (PMI) the definition of a
project is temporary in that it has a defined beginning and end in time, and
therefore defined scope and resources. So from this definition from Project
Management Institute (PMI) and from the list that participants in my classes have
generated, we can learn that the end of a project lifecycle is defined up front
while on the other hand the end of a product life cycle is pretty much
unknown. Because a product life cycle ends when nobody in the market want to
use the product any longer. Nobody can predict when that will happen. Therefore,
we can say in general that a project life cycle is relatively shorter than a
product life cycle. Based on the definition from
Project Management Institute, we can also learn that the focus of a project is
inwards towards the organization, on the other hand the focus of a product is
outward towards the customer. Lastly we can see that the definition of a
successful project is about delivering according to the defined time, scope and
resources. While a successful product is the ones that brings value to customers,
bring profits to the company, and also sustaining in the market. And the two are
not necessarily related. What that means is a successful project may not
necessarily deliver a successful product.
In the second part of the exercise I asked all participants to have a group
discussion and compare the differences between an owner and a manager in the
context of a company. So until today, the participants in my classes said that the
company owner has higher authority than the manager. Secondly, the owner initiates
the company strategy while the manager manages to work towards the strategy. And
lastly, they said that the manager reports to the company owner. In some
companies, there is a misconception that a product owner is below the project
manager in a structure or the hierarchy of the company and the Product Owner
needs to report to the project manager. Now this does not make any sense at all.
As the product lifecycle is relatively longer than a project lifecycle and an
owner has a higher authority than a manager, the reporting line should be the
other way around. Even though this is outside of Scrum context, as Scrum does
not recognize the role of project manager. So let's summarise everything
that we have learned in this video. Semantically the project manager manages
the project while the product owner owns the product. This is a huge difference
that we have to understand. Therefore the Product Owner scope of work and
responsibilities is broader than a project manager scope of work. And also
the Product Owner has higher authority than the project manager. Project manager
need to know project management according to what is defined in the
Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBoK), while a Product Owner needs to have
entrepreneurial skills, marketing skills, data analytics, user experience and other
skills needed to make the product successful in the market. According to
Project Management Institute (PMI) the project manager is successful in doing their job
when the project they managed is on time, has on budget results, learning, and
integration for the organisation. While a Product Owner is successful in doing
their job when the product they own generates customer value, generates
profit for the business, and the product is sustaining in the market. So that is
all for me today folks. I hope you found new insights after
watching this video. If you liked today's video don't forget to smash that like
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this video just hit that dislike button twice. It's as easy as that. See you in my
next video. Bye!