Scrum Master vs Product Owner – Which is a Better Choice? [2022]

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There are many differences between a Scrum Master and a Product Owner that can significantly impact a project’s success.

When you have the skills to work as both, you have a significant advantage in starting your next adventure.

Can you work the dual role and work with more challenges?

Is it possible to work on both roles at the same time?

Scrum Master vs Product Owner has always been a debate in the project management team. If you do not know yet, this article covers these roles and which one is best for you. First, let us understand the roles and responsibilities of both the product owner and the scrum master.

• Who is a Scrum Master?
  • Scrum Master Skills
  • Role of Scrum Master
  • Scrum Master’s Nature of Work
  • Scrum Master Responsibilities
• Who is a Product Owner?
  • Product Owner Skills
  • Role of Product Owner
  • Product Owner’s Nature of Work
  • Product Owner Responsibilities
• Scrum Master vs Product Owner – Can I Play the Dual Role?
• Scrum Master vs Product Owner – The Verdict
• Frequently Asked Questions

Who is a Scrum Master?

A Scrum Master has an in-depth understanding of Scrum methodology, serves as the team’s coach, and makes sure everyone on the team is familiar with Scrum theory and principles. By supporting the product owner and development team and ensuring that the team members adhere to all agile techniques appropriately, they may concentrate on and ensure the project’s success.

Scrum Master Skills

• Knowledgeable
• Encourages Collaboration
• Transparent Communication
• Patience
• Influential
• Growth Mindset and Agility
• Coaching Capabilities

Role of Scrum Master

• Focusing on assisting the Scrum team in operating at their peak performance, and also have the name team lead.
• Focuses on improving team coordination, assisting project procedures, safeguarding the team, mentoring team members, and enabling communication with product owners and the organization.
• Enables team collaboration and guarantees that the team takes appropriate action on all assignments.
• Accountable for the team’s adherence to Agile principles and procedures and for supporting project management procedures.

Scrum Master Certification: Scrum Certification (scrum-certifications.com

Scrum Master’s Nature of Work

The Scrum Master leads the development team as a servant leader, ensures the product’s success, and serves as the Development Team’s point of contact with management.

Scrum Master Responsibilities

• As part of their daily duties, Scrum Masters engage in servant leadership activities such as performance planning, mentoring, self-organization, removal of impediments, dispute resolution, and team service.
• The main competency of a Scrum Master is agile coaching. The Scrum Master’s role includes a significant amount of teaching Scrum techniques, especially to new Scrum teams.
• The job allocation process must be accurate, there must be no task slipping, and deadlines must be met.
• The development team’s performance is the Scrum Master’s main focus. This involves getting rid of any barriers that can prevent the team from working well.
• A Scrum Master is knowledgeable about the methods and tools of Scrum. The Scrum Master’s main duty is to ensure the team follows the Scrum procedures while creating the product.
• Scrum’s daily stand-up meetings are a crucial component. The Scrum master facilitates these sessions, and also makes sure that the team solves all problems are solved and are capable of working effectively to accomplish its sprint goal.

Related Read: What is Project Management Triangle and Why it is Important? – 3 Important Elements

Who is a Product Owner?

An integral member of the Scrum team is the product owner. They are in charge of organizing the requirements list for the development team and managing the product backlog. When describing the features to include in the future product release to the development team, the product owner speaks on behalf of the consumers.

Product Owner Skills

• Domain Proficiency
• Improve Product Value
• Customer-to-Product Translator
• Communication Skills
• Evaluate the Progress of the Product

Role of Product Owner

• The product’s development and improvement were the primary management priorities.
• Focuses on operations and tactics, and assists internal teams, particularly product engineering.
• Produces specific requirements and user stories, controls the product backlog, and decides to produce next to translate high-level vision into activities.
• Participates in retrospectives and manages sprints.

Product Owner Certification: Product Owner Certification from the Home of Scrum

Product Owner’s Nature of Work

The product owner must have a creative vision and work closely with the development team to create the product. In comparison to the duties of the Scrum master, the product owner’s job description is more challenging. The duties of the job, however, might be in the hands of a qualified expert who possesses all the necessary abilities.

Product Owner Responsibilities

• Client satisfaction is the product owner’s top goal, which they do by making sure that stakeholders and the development team are transparent and those customer requirements receive priority.
• Product owners frequently encounter stakeholders that are uncooperative or difficult to deal with thus they have to be equipped with strong interpersonal skills and communication to deal with them. 
• Prioritizing backlog items requires the product owner to possess natural prioritizing abilities.
• The definition of the product’s vision for the development team is the primary responsibility of the product owner. This entails guiding people toward an understanding of the rationale for the creation of the product, its value to customers and other stakeholders, the potential for future development, and desired outcomes.
• In the case of the development team, the product owner must make sure that they completely comprehend what the team must produce, and about the stakeholders, the product owner must make sure that they receive the product that they request.
• Meetings with the development team, stakeholders, and other interested parties talk about the product strategy. Discussion topics may include things on the current product backlog, upcoming releases, and any technical knowledge the stakeholder may require.

People also read: Kanban vs Scrum: Project Management Methodologies and Their Differences [2022]

Scrum Master vs Product Owner – Can I Play the Dual Role?

The straightforward answer is no, but you must understand why.

On the roles and responsibilities part of both Scrum master and product owner, it may seem like they overlap, but they both have different roles to fill.

To achieve business needs, a project manager aids in managing the project’s timing, resources, and scope. However, a Scrum master contributes to the success of the Scrum team.

A product owner establishes direction in collaboration with the client and team. To finish the work the product owner prioritizes, the development team receives guidance from a Scrum master, who also serves as a coach and facilitator.

The Scrum master collaborates with the product owner and the development team to guarantee that they follow Scrum practices and that the team members may proceed in development without any obstacles.

Scrum masters don’t have the same access to customer input when they take on the role of product owners, and it’s challenging to develop items that satisfy the demands and objectives of your clients without this information as you will spend all this time producing goods that your clients may not want.

When product owners take on the role of Scrum masters, they assume additional tasks that lessen the importance of their prior ones. The product owner has a full-time job, therefore they must make compromises while managing the development process and building the product backlog if they also take on the role of Scrum master. The unfortunate side effect is a team with less encouragement and meeting deadlines, rather than making the best possible product is the new goal, which shatters innovation.

Scrum Master vs Product Owner – The Verdict

The nature of a Scrum master vs. a product owner is a sensitive topic, that is open to debate. These arguments stem from each person’s opinion on what is the right answer to the question of who goes where in a Scrum project.

Based on the principles of Agile, and the opinions of the majority of Agile experts, Scrum master, and product owner roles are separate and distinct positions. The product owner is responsible for bringing vision to the present and for making decisions about every feature the tea offers. The Scrum master, however, has responsibilities that go beyond that, including helping the entire team work together, facilitating the flow of work through the project, and helping the team understand the product owner’s vision, which means the roles are not equal and the Product Owner is not responsible for the Scrum Master.

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Simon Calder

Chris “Simon” Calder was working as a Project Manager in IT for one of Los Angeles’ most prestigious cultural institutions, LACMA.He taught himself to use Microsoft Project from a giant textbook and hated every moment of it. Online learning was in its infancy then, but he spotted an opportunity and made an online MS Project course - the rest, as they say, is history!