Scott Sehlhorst is an agile product manager, product owner, and business analyst and architect. He helps teams achieve software product success by helping them build "the right stuff" and "build the right stuff right." Scott started Tyner Blain in 2005 to focus on helping companies translate strategy and market insights into great products and solutions. Read more at tynerblain.com/blog.
Product owners are constantly beset with a continuous stream of requests for the urgent, the important, and the marginal. The assumption implicit in such requests is that there is room for more of the "but we need this" requests to be filled.
In the agile community there is a movement called “no estimates”—where people are challenging the value and validity of estimating the work required to develop software. Scott Sehlhorst looks at the different perspectives of those who challenge estimation.
There are two ways to think about scope—a list of things to be done or a list of goals to accomplish. As long as scope is defined as a list of things, then your project process is not agile, even if your team is using the mechanisms of agile development within the code creation cycle.
Product managers know that a product needs to be simple to succeed in a market. Although being simple is a product virtue, being simplistic can be a product vice. Scott Sehlhorst evaluates why it's better to create a product that is simple—not simplistic.
Strategy is important not just because you want to be intentional but also because strategy makes you more efficient. Strategic activities ensure the intended product is the right product. Scott Sehlhorst looks at why a strategy is not a plan; instead, strategy guides planning.
Software architects typically don’t own the products that individual teams are creating, yet they help define a cohesive approach to developing the products and are often responsible for defining how different products interoperate. Scott Sehlhorst looks at the idea of architecture stewardship.
Early on product positioning helps drive focus and clarity for the team and allows a stakeholder to approach funding decisions from a strategic perspective. Scott Sehlhorst highlights some outside-in approaches to product positioning and their benefits.
