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The product Owner: an agile role in fixed-price projects

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Some digital projects require a fast and efficient implementation in order to meet legal and financial aspects or simply be part of a global strategic approach to digital transformation. The "fixed price" approach is then preferred but does not often integrate an agile approach, which is essential though. Product Owners (PO) then have their role adapted by integrating a wider range of responsibilities while keeping their main objective: namely to identify the vital functional scope, bringing real benefits to users to ensure maximum adoption of the product and guarantee the success of the project. Explanations with Marie-Astrid de Taillandier, PO at Fujitsu Luxembourg.

Fixed price and agility

 

Unlike a traditional agile approach where features are reviewed over time, a fixed-price project must have a clear structure upstream of implementation. This turns into the need to identify core product functionalities to define a minimum viable product to be delivered in accordance with time and financial requirements. The Product Owner must then make sure to conduct a lean approach to guide the customer to think or even rethink his specifications to determine the functional core while keeping a global vision of the product.

 

As a result, the collection of requirements by the Product Owner often ends with the definition of an evolutionary implementation roadmap, i.e. the identification of several new functional blocks opening up to a possible phasing of the product.

 

Product Owner: an agile role suitable for fixed-price implementation.

 

In an agile context, the Product Owner's role is to collect needs, schedule the functionalities to be delivered in predefined sprints and ensure the quality of deliverables. It also has the role of being the single point of contact with stakeholders to maintain the smooth running of the delivery. Finally, he must envision the global product to readjust and guide the customer on the relevant specifications to his final product.

In a fixed-price project, the Product Owner keeps all the characteristics of his role but will have them evolved to guarantee delivery according to financial and time constraints. Its central role is de facto reinforced.

From now on, it is up to him to establish the content of the sprint in terms of functionalities to be delivered based on the development workload estimates made upstream of the implementation. He is the decision-maker when it comes to content modification and works closely with the development team to overcome all technical and functional unforeseen events in an optimized time.

In addition, although it is in fixed price with a specific product backlog, it may need to evolve. In this case, the Product Owner takes advantage of the agile approach to evaluate change requests, process them and potentially integrate them into the product backlog. The integration can be done during the current phase or in the established roadmap.

 

Product Owner – Quality asset in project delivery

 

In a fixed price project, criticality induces frequently the implementation of a project manager, which is not the case with the traditional agile approach.  However, to keep the agile approach as much as possible, the project manager must now rely on the Product Owner in the delivery process.

Thus, in addition to stakeholders and development team, the Product Owner is then required to work closely with the project manager by having additional responsibilities such as reporting and participation in team coordination.

Whether the project is a fixed price or with a traditional agile approach, in order to facilitate successful delivery, communication must be transparent and ubiquitous. The Product Owner has to be committed in terms of availability to internal teams to avoid as much as possible any impediment that could jeopardize the delivery of the sprint. This availability should be complete as well with the customer to quickly address the problems encountered and monitor the progress of the implementation.

In addition to communication, the Product Owner is also the custodian of the technical-functional documents. He may be responsible for helping the customer train end users and accompany them to promote the product.

 

In conclusion

 

As fixed-price agile projects become more and more a reality in the delivery of digital projects, the role of the Product Owner is strengthened at all stages of the project life cycle.

It then becomes an essential role for a successful delivery of a high value-added MVP within a given time.