Definition
Product Owner is a role defined in the Scrum framework. The Product Owner is the single person accountable for maximizing the value delivered by the Scrum team, primarily through managing the product backlog -- deciding what gets built, in what order, and what "done" means for each item.
The Scrum Guide is explicit: there is one Product Owner per Scrum team, and their decisions about the backlog must be respected by the organization. In practice, this authority varies wildly. At some companies, the PO has genuine decision-making power. At others, the PO is essentially a backlog administrator who takes orders from stakeholders.
The role emerged from the Scrum framework created by Ken Schwaber and Jeff Sutherland in the mid-1990s. It was designed to solve a specific problem: development teams that built features nobody wanted because there was no single person accountable for defining value.
Why It Matters for Product Managers
The Product Owner vs. Product Manager distinction is one of the most debated topics in product organizations. At companies that practice Scrum, PMs often hold the Product Owner role as a subset of their responsibilities. But the roles have different origins and different scopes.
A Product Manager is a business role: they own strategy, conduct user research, analyze markets, define pricing, and coordinate go-to-market. A Product Owner is a process role: they write user stories, prioritize the backlog, attend sprint ceremonies, and accept completed work. A PM who also serves as PO does both. At large enterprises using SAFe (Scaled Agile Framework), the roles are explicitly split: PMs handle strategy at the "Program" level, and POs handle execution at the "Team" level.
Understanding where your company draws this line is critical for knowing your actual authority. If you are a PO without PM-level strategic ownership, your influence is limited to sprint-level decisions. If you are a PM who also holds the PO role, you are expected to be in sprint planning, daily standups, and reviews -- which can consume 40-60% of your week.
How It Works in Practice
Own the backlog -- Maintain a single, ordered list of everything the team might build. Each item has a clear description, acceptance criteria, and a priority. Tools like Jira, Linear, or Shortcut typically house the backlog.
Write user stories -- Break down features into stories that engineers can estimate and build in a sprint. Good stories follow the format: "As a [user type], I want [action] so that [benefit]." Include acceptance criteria specific enough that QA can test against them.
Prioritize ruthlessly -- The backlog is ordered, not just categorized. Item #1 is the most important thing the team should work on next. This requires saying "not now" to stakeholders regularly. Frameworks like RICE or weighted scoring can structure the decision.
Be available during sprints -- Engineers will have questions about stories. The PO needs to be available (within reason) to clarify scope, make micro-decisions, and unblock the team. If you are unreachable, engineers will guess -- and often guess wrong.
Accept or reject work -- At sprint review, the PO decides whether completed stories meet the acceptance criteria. This is a real gatekeeping function: if the work does not meet the definition of done, it goes back to the backlog.
Common Pitfalls
Treating the PO role as a proxy for stakeholders. If you just relay what the sales team or CEO wants without filtering through user value, you are a ticket taker, not a Product Owner.
Writing vague user stories. "Improve the dashboard" is not a user story. "As a sales manager, I want to filter the pipeline dashboard by region so I can review my team's quarterly progress" gives engineers something they can actually build and test.
Skipping backlog refinement. Teams that skip regular grooming sessions (weekly or bi-weekly) end up in sprint planning with stories that are too large, poorly understood, or missing acceptance criteria. Sprint planning should be a confirmation, not a discovery session.
One PO across multiple teams. The Scrum Guide says one PO per team. Stretching a single PO across three teams means no team gets enough attention, and prioritization conflicts between teams go unresolved.
Related Concepts
Scrum -- the framework that defines the Product Owner role and its ceremonies
Backlog -- the ordered list of work items that the Product Owner manages
Product Strategy -- the strategic layer that informs what the Product Owner prioritizes in the backlogExplore More PM Terms
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