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   Certified Scrum Product Owner®

Certified Scrum Product Owner®

Instructor

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Certified Scrum Product Owner®

Certified Scrum Product Owner®

Though each CSPO course varies depending on the instructor, all Certified Scrum Product Owner® courses focus on Scrum from a product owner's perspective. Graduates will receive the CSPO designation. All CSPO courses are taught by Trainers approved by the Scrum Alliance.

 

The Product Owner is the business representative on the Scrum Team. It is a big job to manage stakeholder desires and expectations, manage the Product Backlog to achieve maximum value and keep the Development Team working at a steady flow. The Product Owner is responsible for maximizing the delivery of value to the customer and return on investment to the organization. The Product Owner is the source of high-value work for the Development Team so that it can develop the best product incrementally.

In this class we will cover the basics of Scrum from the Product Owner's perspective and then drill down on the critical skills for success. These skills include creation and management of the Product Backlog, articulating the product vision, working with User Stories, prioritizing functionality for optimal value creation, planning and managing product releases and working with the Development Team.

The Certificate

Certification requires that you be present and participating for the entire class . There is currently no exam for this certifcation. We do not use computers in this class and we request that you use your electronic devices only at break times. More information about the certification is available here.

The Course

This class runs from 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM. Course attendees are encouraged to have basic knowledge of the Scrum framework from books, journal articles, and online content. Prior experience with Scrum is a plus. We highly recommend that you read this article.

The class a highly interactive and immersive. Come prepared to participate in many hands-on exercises and discussions. We cover the basics of Scrum first, then work through an example product definition, development and release experience as a framework for learning Product Owner tools and tricks of the trade. 

 

The Venues

Our public classes are held at business-class venues with the amenities you would expect. We try to have plenty of elbow room and wall space for the class work. We provide morning and afternoon snacks, lunch and beverages throughout the day. All of this is included in the course price. Parking is also included. Ask us about hotel discounts if you have to stay overnight.

For private classes, we will use whatever space your company has available or arrange for a public space when needed.

The Instructor

Roger Brown has been coaching and training in Agile and Scrum since 2004. He was a software developer for more years than he cares to admit, working in many domains and systems. His development experience includes Dartmouth College, Microsoft and TeleAtlas. He was active in internet programming before the "world-wide web" existed.

Roger has done Agile and Scrum training in the US, Canada, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Belgium, Sweden, Australia and India. He prefers to stay close to home in California these days, though, so you will see most of our classes happening on the West Coast, USA.

Roger spends at least half of his time coaching Scrum Teams and the organizations around them. His clients include many small, unknown companies and many big, well-known companies, most of them in California. He is a founding member of the Scrum Alliance Certified Scrum Coach program. You can see a list of our training and coaching clients here.

Why Choose This Class?

There are many choices for Scrum Alliance Scrum Certification™. In California, particularly in the North, there are dozens of trainers who fly in to do a CSM or CSPO every once in a while. We are located in San Jose and have been doing classes in San Francisco, Silicon Valley and Los Angeles since 2008. So what? It means that you Californians can get personalized follow-up coaching and private training in Scrum, Lean and Agile Development from a local one-stop shop instead of trying to figure out where your instructor came from.

In addition, this class is a lot of fun. Many people have remarked that it is the best technical course they have ever attended. Accelerated Learning techniques are not only engaging, they greatly increase your learning and retention.

We don't give away any prizes or do any raffles, but you will leave the class with these new possessions:

  • A basic understanding of the Agile values and principles
  • A good feel for how and why Scrum works
  • A stress ball to help you deal with organizational impediments
  • A printed copy of the class slides full of whatever notes you take
  • A 2-year membership in the Scrum Alliance
  • Membership in a few Scrum-related discussion groups
  • 14 PDUs if you are a PMP
Dates:

15-16 Dec 2014

Location:

San Diego, CA, United States of America

Language:

English

Venue:

Radisson Hotel San Diego-Rancho Bernardo
11520 W Bernardo Ct
San Diego, CA, United States of America 92127

Price:

$1295

Discounts:

Discounted seats available. Contact Roger Brown for more information.

Notes:

About the Instructor

Roger Brown is an independent Agile Coach who provides training, consulting and coaching services in Agile software development areas including Scrum project management and enterprise agile adoption. Roger also does training and mentoring in agile engineering practices such as Test-Driven Development, automated acceptance testing and continuous integration. Roger is focused on helping companies and individuals find their own best approaches to the use of agile methods.

Roger is a Certified Scrum Trainer and Certified Scrum Coach. He is a member of the Scrum Alliance, the Agile Alliance and the Agile Project Leadership Network (APLN). Roger is a founding member and certification board member for the Certified Scrum Coach program. Roger is a veteran software engineer, technical project manager and people manager. He has worked with both large and small companies in many industries. His work experience includes Dartmouth College, Vicinity Corporation, Microsoft and TeleAtlas.

Testimonials

"This is a must-have for someone struggling to introduce Scrum to their organization/team. One comes out so much richer with ideas and solutions. Kudos to Roger!" - Barclays Global Investors

"The CSM course exceeded my expectations for content, delivery, team dynamics, and fun! I thoroughly enjoyed and benefitted from this experience!" - Anonymous

"Roger turned me from a skeptic to a firm believer in Scrum and Agile, eager to effect change in my organization" - Raptr Inc

"Roger made it fun to learn!" - Independent Consultant

 

 

 

Certified Scrum Product Owner Course Agenda

These are the topics cover in class. As with life in general, there is more to do than time to do it, so we have to prioritize to suit the participants' interest. We also cover many other topics as they come up, some in real time and some in the parking lot section at the end. For any special-interest topics we do not get to, we follow up the class with our list of Agile/Scrum articles.

The class will choose a subset of the following topics to cover. Some are required for certification, some are optional. Participants will make a joint prioritiy decision on which they agree on as most important, just like real-life Product Owners do every day.

 

* = required for certification

Product Ownership   *                                         

  • Your organization may encounter challenges to product ownership
  • The Product Owner job has three main dimensions that make it a very large job for one person

  

Opening  *                                                            

  • The overall objectives of the course are listed
  • The course materials include too much information for the time available. What shall we do?

 

Agile Principles  *                                                 

  •  Agile software development implements Lean principles and dynamics
  • The primary driver of Agile work is Value
  • Scrum is one form of Agile, designed initially for software development but applicable to other kinds of work

 

Scrum Framework  *                                       

  • Scrum has 4 meetings and 3 artifacts
  • Scrum has 3 roles that share the responsibility of creating value in small increments
  • The roles complement each other to create a balanced team

 

Scrum Planning  *                                               

  • Scrum planning is continuous
  • Scrum planning happens at 5 levels, each with a different time horizon
  • The Product Backlog is the primary source of work to be completed and value to be delivered

 

Product Vision  *                                                  

  • The Vision describes the purpose of the product to be created or enhanced
  • There are several ways to present the vision as a common goal for the Scrum Team
  • The Vision is the inspiration for the Product Backlog

 

Product Roadmap                                             

  • Roadmapping is a tool for creating a longer term release strategy
  • Roadmaps describe the product in very high level terms

 

User Stories  *                                                      

  • User Stories are simple descriptions of desired functionality
  • Stories are elaborated just-in-time for implementation
  • Stories are used for planning
  • The INVEST Criteria help us write good stories

 

Prioritization  *                                                    

  • Priorities help the Scrum Team decide what to do next
  • Priorities help with long term planning
  • Prioritization can be done in many ways, based on many criteria

 

Estimation                                                      

  • Agile estimation is done at both the high level and the low level
  • Estimates are used for planning and for tracking progress
  • Estimates are done quickly, by the Development Team
  • Estimates are not commitments

 

Story Splitting  *                                        

  • Smaller stories are easier to work with and enhance flow
  • Smaller stories gives us more options to reduce scope

 

Story Mapping

  • Story Maps are a 2-Dimensional representation of the Product Backlog
  • Story Maps are an easy way to visualize what is in and what is out of the next release

 

Working with the Dev Team   *                  

  • The Dev Team may propose stories for the Product Backlog
  • Teams take time to mature
  • The Dev Team is self-organizing
  • Awareness of effective motivators can help build a high performance team

 

Working with the ScrumMaster              

  • The ScrumMaster is your partner in achieving a smooth flow and continuous improvement
  • The ScrumMaster is a productivity multiplier for the Team

 

Working with Stakeholders                     

  • Customers are not your only Stakeholders
  • You can’t please everyone all the time

 

Scrum Meetings  *                                      

  • Scrum organizes work into 1-4 week time boxes called Sprints
  • Each Sprint has 4 primary meetings
  • The bulk of the time is spent creating value in the form of a product

 

Product Backlog Management   *                  

  • A well-managed Product Backlog keeps the Development Team running smoothly
  • A 1-sprint look-ahead on stories will help the flow
  • The Team needs details Just In Time
  • Defining Ready and Done will dramatically reduce time waste

 

Just-in-Time Elabortion  *

  • Story elaboration is done just in time to reduce wasted time defining details that may never get used
  • Details are provided to the Dev Team as conversations, acceptance criteria and speclets
  • Details may also lead to story splits

 

Release Planning  *                                          

  • There are two basic product release strategies based on time and scope
  • Risk is reduced by including slack in the plan
  • Release tracking and forecasting are based on real data about actual product completed

 

FAQ/Parking Lot                                              

  • What questions remain?

 

Product Ownership Review                          

  • The Product Owner is a navigator in the world of profit-making
  • What skills would you look for in a Product Owner?

 

Closing  *                                                              

  • More information for Product Owners
  • Wrapping up

 

Electives

Where do Stories Come From?                    

  • Agile Teams may build product faster than traditional methods can discover user needs
  • There are few more Agile methods for finding customer needs

 

Budget and Finance                                       

  • Budgeting relies on Release Planning
  • Velocity is the primary unknown in budget requests
  • Some organizations are moving to more Agile budgeting models

 

Scaling Scrum Up and Out                             

  • Scrum can scale to many Teams
  • Distributed Scrum is constrained by the laws of physics but there are patterns that can help

 

Portfolio Management                                   

  • Agile and Scrum concepts can be applied at the product portfolio level

 

Homework                                                         

  • Read 2 articles
  • Discuss one

 

Focus and Flow                                      

  • Scrum works best when the Team achieves a smooth flow of work
  • Scrum dynamics are based on the mathematics of queuing theory that we use to manage the Internet
  • Continuous improvement is an underlying goal of Scrum

 

Other Prioritization Tools                            

  • Relative Weighting can be applied to Stories
  • Financial Projection can be applied to Releases and Features
  • Innovation Games can quickly get input from your customers

 

Action Plan (Private classes only)              

  • What concrete actions can we take to incorporate these concepts in our Scrum work?

 

 

Who Should Attend?

This class is specific to the Product Owner role in Scrum. It is not for everyone, but there are many people in your organization who will benefit from the concepts we cover, including:

  • Working or soon-to-be Product Owners
  • Product Managers looking to transition to Scrum
  • ScrumMasters and Agile Coaches who want to increase their understanding and ability to support Product Owners
  • Business Analysts who may be working with Product Owners and Scrum Teams as advisors, SMEs or proxy Product Owners
  • Marketing and Sales staff who want to understand the dynamics of incremental product releases
  • Executives who want to shift to more agile product development