How to recognize a true Product Owner

There are many examples of fake POs in the companies (PO as Business Analyst, PO as Project Manager, Proxy PO). Companies cause this by using many og design antipatterns (assign one PO per team, "Product" being in fact a component, using committee for product decisions instead of one person). Sometimes these antipatterns are hard to see because they are hidden in the history and organization layers of the company. Are there any clear indicators that tell us that a person X is a true PO (in the Scrum and LeSS sense)? I think yes and I would like to emphasize them in the talk.

For example:

  • a true PO can kill the product
  • a true PO doesn't need to prepare status reports
  • a true PO spends more time talking to customers than to teams

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