project management

6 Things you Should Know about the Product Owner of Agile

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As per the survey being conducted regarding the roles, artifacts, and events that are taking place in Agile, the team came to know that many doubts are going on about the roles of the product owner. Let’s have a piece of detailed information about the product owner and the 6 things you should know about them.

Source:medium.com

What does one mean by the Product Owner of Agile?

According to Vinsys, the product owner is a key stakeholder of a typical project. The main part of the product owner lies where he has the responsibilities and a vision of what one wishes to build and has to convey that vision to his Agile team.

The product owner is also responsible for the results created by the development team for maximizing the value of the product. To get success as a product owner, he must get the respect for his decisions from the organization.

The decisions of the product owner are mainly seen in the context of project management and the ordering of the product’s backlog. As the product owner is a person, the department team can work from different sets of departments without getting any force.

Roles of Product Owner of Agile

Source:agilevelocity.com

Here, we have described the role of a product owner concerning scrum as you know it is a part of Agile. As per the experts, the main role of the product owner is to ensure the product formed is being valued by the customers and the users and should also benefit the company.

Below we discuss a few roles of the product owner to make sure that they understand the core quality of the products and its collaboration.

1. Vision

As discussed above, the product owner has the responsibility of creating a better vision for himself as well as for the department team. The vision helps the stakeholders to have a clear-cut vision by understanding the outcome of the product.

2. To manage the product backlog

Source:medium.com

Managing the product backlog is one of the primary and crucial roles of the product owner. The main responsibility of the product owner is to bring the stack of items and prioritize them as per the goal set for the business and global approach.

3. Need Prioritization

To deliver the maximum outcomes, the product owner should know what all items are needed for the prioritization. The items in the backlog would help to achieve the goal and success.

6 things you should know about the product owner of Agile

  1. Concerning the Scrum Team

  • If we talk about the product owner of the scrum team, then they are considered as another member of that team.
  • But for the obvious things, one should not take anyone for granted because all have their work and role to play in the field of project management.
  • The position of the product owner is gained by a single person and there are no rights to share it with multiple people.
  • By performing individually, one would help to prioritize the backlog without generating any conflicts.
  • The sprint goal is developed if the assigned task is worked together with the department team of Agile.
  • The sprint goals are set while sprint planning so that a more defined business objective could be obtained by the product owner.
Source:medium.com

Thus, this was the point concerning the scrum team.

  1. Concerning Artifacts

An artifact is an object of Scrum that belongs to the department team.

  • Spring backlog is a part of an artifact that cannot be modified according to project management.
  • Artifacts are the owner of the product backlog and cannot represent the management.
  • Monitoring and sharing of the product backlog are possible by artifacts.
  • One can maintain, create, and order the product backlog with the help of an artifact.
  • To get the exact idea of the product backlog, one must collaborate with stakeholders and project managers.

  1. With regards to Events

  • For the sprint review, one must summon the stakeholders.
  • The starting and ending of the sprint date cannot be changed as it is included in project management.
  • You can inspect and create an improvement in the scrum team by attending scrum retrospective.
  • If the goal of the product owner is not absolute, the sprint can be canceled. This happens in a very rare case.

  1. Regarding the Product

  • The responsibilities of the product owner continue till the completion of the entire cycle of the product.
  • Product owners would entail all the investments including conception, development, operation, and maintenance that are to be made in the product by getting involved as an in-charge of the total cost of ownership.
  • Feedback should be gained from the market regarding the product after releasing the increments of product.
  • Product owner of Agile must be one who has all the knowledge about the progress and the business objectives that would lead to an increase in the product.
  • The decision of increasing of product should be made by the product owner.

  1. With regards to general scope

  • The product owner must have time to decide the ability of the organization and to influence it to get the better work done by the department team.
  • The product owner on some occasions has acquired a higher position that would lead the capacity to influence the organization and can also have complications in the agenda for having little time for project completion.
  • Complication between how and what can be cleared because the work of the department team is to perform the task by choosing how to do it and concerning that the work of the product owner is to indicate what to do with the items of the product backlog.

  1. Help of the Scrum team Agile

Source:scrum.org

The sprint review must be provided by the scrum team that can be counted as help for the rest of the team. It includes some of the major points such as:

  • Reviewing the current status of the product backlog
  • Inspection of product
  • Item delivered should comply with DoD
  • Inspection should be done with the stakeholders as the market changes the potential use of the product
  • Update the backlog of the product.
  • Based on the status of the department team, the projections for the probable about the release date can be made.

Agile is a way of life that contains the basic guides of commitments, focus, respect, courage, and frankness that could govern the product owner day by day.

How to Start Your Project Successfully: A Step-by-Step Guideline

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According to the Project Management Institute (PMI), projects can often fail because of the following factors:

  • Project managers or owners focus more on technical details rather than business value.
  • There is a lack of a standardized view on how to measure results. 
  • There are no measurements to evaluate productivity in order to compare this data to similar projects.
  • Project managers don’t have a certain methodology to plan and execute the projects.
  • Customers don’t take an active part in project planning.
  • Team members are not motivated.
  • Team members don’t have enough tools or skills to develop a project. 

As you can see, there are lots of factors can lead to the project’s failure. Thus, if you are on your start line to create something new, make sure that you know how to start the one successfully. In this post, you will learn about the main steps to follow when starting a project, what factors affect success, and which tools to use.

What Is a Project Management Triangle?

Managers use the project management triangle model to identify and analyze the key issues that they can meet during the project execution. The core constraints of any project include scope, time, and cost that are altogether known as PM triangle. 

To be prepared for any difficulties, you should clearly understand each of the points of the triangle. 

Img source: Wikipedia

Scope

The scope of the project includes deliverables that should be completed. Any changes in the scope can influence cost and time. Thus, it should be well-planned and understood by all the team members.

Time

The time needed to complete the project tasks depends on many factors including the number of team members, their experience, and skills. Considering time aspects, project managers have to remember about deadlines. 

Cost

Any costs should be estimated beforehand; that is crucial for both project managers and customers. An allocated budget ensures that the product is developed on time and within budget. 

As you can see in the image above, quality stands in the center of the project management triangle. Although quality is not a part of the triangle, it is considered to be the primary objective of any product delivery that impacts the project’s success. Below is a step-by-step guideline to seamlessly start your project considering constraints triangle into account. 

Img source: massideation.agency

Initiation Phase: Steps to Start a Project

Step 1 – Business Case

A business case will help you find out and structure the reasons why you start a given project. Business cases, usually, support business needs and are adaptable to fit the risks and scope of a certain project, however, structurally will be the same for each of your projects.

Simply put, it is a document that must be easily understood. Typically, a business case consists of a preface, a table of contents, a project briefing, an introduction, a scope, and financial data along with some conclusions. 

Step 2 – Feasibility Study

The next step in the initiation phase is conducting a feasibility analysis. It demonstrates all the business problems and all the possible ways to solve those problems. This study is aimed to determine the opportunities and document what specifically is required to accomplish the project successfully. At the same time, participants of a feasibility analysis identify all the possible risks along with the means to eliminate them. 

Step 3 – Project Charter

Charters determine the structure, objectives, and project execution plan. They contain detailed information about the deliverables and scope, roles and responsibilities of the stakeholders. 

Img source: it-starts.com

Step 4 – Team

You can’t start a project without a suitable team with the right skills and experience. Thus, your next step is to write job descriptions. In these descriptions, you should provide detailed information about the roles and responsibilities of each team member. Also, you should list the experience and skills that you need to accomplish the project. 

Step 5 – Project Office

The next step of any initiation phase is to determine the workspace where the team will be based while developing the project. You should also discuss the communication and technology stack issues. The workflow must be outlined, as well. 

Step 6 – Review

After all the steps of the initiation phase are followed, you need to review everything. By reviewing the phase, you will be able to determine if all the steps were followed and if all the requirements are met. This phase should be constantly reviewed within the whole SDLC. 

Factors Affecting the Success of a Project Start Phase

Img source: informa-mea.com

Any project idea may be great but not be realized because of the wrong initiation steps. Thus, you should consider the key factors of a productive project. 

  1. Validated idea
  2. Clear goals
  3. Clear requirements
  4. Concrete milestones
  5. Steps to follow
  6. Encouraged team
  7. Customer’s support

A lot of projects start with great ideas and the intention to take over the world. However, without enough motivation and enthusiasm, projects can fail. Before starting to develop a project, validate if it is valuable to your buying persona. You can consult with Diceus dedicated development team on how to conduct a proper business analysis or ask them to carry it out. 

To achieve success in project development, you should also set clear goals. With concrete objectives in place, you will be able to develop the right strategy. Based on your key objectives, you will sort out the major requirements for the project and set milestones along with the deadlines. As you can see, there are a lot of factors you should keep in mind to gain success. Besides, you must have a set of specific tools to track time, monitor progress, plan milestones; be sure you have also professional developers and other needed resources to accomplish your project. 

9 Incredible Agile Project Management Statistics for 2018 You Need-To-Know

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Businesses are going through a basic transformation in their processes and methodologies that they are adopting. ‘Thinking’ and ‘automation’ machines are replacing tasks done by humans, as well as modifying the skills that organizations desire in their employees.

The information mentioned in the article equips you with knowledge about the things that need to be considered to enhance the chances of success of the project. It also offers much-needed assistance to deal with the key challenges in this field.

What are the major challenges faced by a project management team?

Img source: Systemation.com

Most of the organizations don’t benefit from best practices in the project management techniques and HR monitoring solutions. As seen in various organizations, a project management team faces a number of challenges. These are mentioned below as:

  • Poorly trained PM’s (Project Managers)
  • Trying to run a lot of projects at once
  • Not much support of the senior management
  • Poor management of resource
  • Poorly skilled project sponsors

Innovation rules

Digital technology and platforms enable people who come with winning ideas and permits niche profit markers and specialist to flourish. In the world, where innovation outperforms regulation and ideas rule, risks are bound to be high. Thus, a business needs to create impressive and robust strategies to overcome the challenges effectively and quickly.

10 project management statistics for 2018

Img source: edu.stemjobs.com

After a study carried out in top business firms like PWC and Wellington, a few project management statistics were defined. These are:

A lack of clearly defined business objectives goals is the commonest factor behind project failure

  1. Only 37% of business teams in the entire U.K. reported to accomplish projects successfully and on time quite often than not.
  2. 73% of employees in the U.S. have this notion that technology does not have the ability to replace the mind of the human.
  3. As on March 2018, the average salary of project manager countrywide is $80,854. This makes it clear that a career in project management can be a very lucrative choice.
  4. Between the year 2015 and 2016, % of organizations who were using spreadsheets to effectively manage their “Agile projects” reduced from 73% to 66%.
  5. 85% of companies have a project management office. Almost 45% of PMO staffing personnel’s have earned PMP certification.
  6. 90% of firms confirmed that an open source software enhanced their efficiency, innovation and
  7. 5% of businesses agreed that management of project cost was the main problem that was faced by manufacturing PM’s in the year 2017.
  8. Around 56.6% of manufacturers used a mix of PM methodologies.
  9. 59% of the total U.S. employees have the opinion that communication is the major obstacle to the success of their team.

Conclusion

Img source: codeburst.io

As a PM (project manager), you have to interpret the budget, KPIs, timelines to determine when the business is heading in the right way and when modifications have to be made. The above statistics will tell the time when the business needs to upgrade from free PM software to a paid one.