Blackblot PMTK and LeSS
Introduction
This review explores the compatibility of the Blackblot Product Manager’s Toolkit® (PMTK), a market-driven product management methodology, with the product management function in Large-Scale Scrum (LeSS®), a software development method.
LeSS Background
LeSS originated in 2005 and emerged out of work by Craig Larman and Bas Vodde at Nokia Siemens Networks to apply the principles and ideals of Agile and Scrum to the enterprise.
The intent was to scale Scrum product development to multiple teams.
LeSS’s Character
LeSS is described as a lightweight or Agile framework for scaling Scrum to multiple teams who work on a single product.
Promoted as a minimalistic framework that advocates empiricism, LeSS encourages teams to adjust their implementation according to their needs.
With the notion that having companies scale down a comprehensive framework is the wrong way, LeSS instead is built to allow organizations to expand the minimalistic framework as required.
LeSS consists of ten principles, rules, configurations for small and large numbers of teams, guides (suggested recommendations), and a set of experiments.
LeSS Pros and Cons
LeSS benefits from Scrum’s widespread adoption by positioning itself as a natural progression from current Scrum implementations.
Leveraging existing Scrum teams to use LeSS purportedly results in lower implementation and training costs and lower overhead.
LeSS is proclaimed as minimalistic, ostensibly allowing for easier and flexible tailoring of LeSS to different scenarios.
However, LeSS is not prescriptive enough, a disadvantage for those seeking definitive guidance.
LeSS is inherently based on Scrum, and not all companies and practitioners favor Scrum.
Lastly, LeSS is overshadowed by the rise of the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe®), so it is more challenging to find resources and experts on LeSS compared to SAFe.
The LeSS Product Owner
LeSS argues that the LeSS Product Owner role is different from the Scrum Product Owner role.
More explicitly, the LeSS Product Owner is not a Scrum Product Owner. LeSS views these roles as having different responsibilities.
In LeSS, the Product Owner is less likely to engage in product backlog refinement (product backlog grooming) than a Scrum Product Owner who is highly likely to engage in backlog grooming.
In LeSS, product backlog refinement is primarily owned by the teams.
The LeSS Product Owner is not a team output owner since the teams in LeSS are responsible for the allocation, cross-team coordination, and how prioritized customer-centric items are to be accomplished.
It is worth noting that LeSS does not advocate that a Product Manager will also be a Scrum Product Owner.
LeSS and Product Management
The second Blackblot PMTK Methodology™ foundation rule states:
PMTK Rule #2 — Product management resides solely in the problem space.
In PMTK, the problem and solution spaces designate the separation between product management and product development.
PMTK’s authors arrived at this conclusion by conceiving a product management theory and accompanying methodology.
Based on LeSS literature, leading proponents of LeSS interpret product management as a problem space function. This view conforms to the PMTK’s second foundation rule.
LeSS’s official literature hints that the authors came to view product management or the Product Manager role as stated based on their extensive experience and experimentation when adopting LeSS in companies with product managers.
LeSS’s perspective is that the roles of the Product Manager and LeSS Product Owner are interchangeable, meaning they have highly overlapping responsibilities.
The LeSS Product Owner is responsible for maximizing the product’s Return On Investment (ROI) by being deeply knowledgeable about the product, market, and customers.
In PMTK, the Product Manager is a highly strategic role owned by a market expert responsible for managing the market problem that the product solves. Although not explicitly stated, LeSS views the Product Manager role similarly.
Summary
Large-Scale Scrum (LeSS®) demonstrates an empirical view of product management and the Product Manager role that is in agreement with PMTK.
Consequently, Blackblot PMTK Methodology™ and Large-Scale Scrum (LeSS®) are compatible in their views of product management.