SAFe Product Manager vs Product Owner: Top Key Differences

The roles of 'Product Manager' (PM) and 'Product Owner' (PO) or POMP are typical in organizations implementing agile overview work practices. These positions are separate in SAFe, and each has its own set of responsibilities. What do a product manager and a product owner have in common? 

The terms are frequently confused, and there is considerable overlap. Product manager and product owner jobs, on the other hand, are distinct. Today, we'll compare and contrast the abilities and responsibilities of a product owner and a product manager. We will explore whether or not there is a difference between product owner and product manager!  

In most firms, the difference between a Product Manager and a Product Owner is hazy. Is the Product Manager responsible for the Product Owner? Is the Product Manager a Product Owner's direct report? 

With so much disagreement in the industry, we'll answer this age-old question of the difference between product owner and product manager, so you know where you stand. You can also choose KnowledgeHut POPM to enhance your career further.

There are multiple competing definitions for the highest level of product managers and product owners. ‘What is the difference between product owner and product manager’ is a common call in the firm. But, to the degree that there is an agreement on the essential distinction between product managers and product owners, it is as follows:

The Role of a Product Manager

Product Manager (PM) - Benefits to the client and the company are the emphasis of the product manager. Before a feature can be picked up by one of the agile teams, the PMs prioritise it and make sure that it has clearly defined advantages for the client and/or the organisation. 

The PM is also the main point of contact for business owners and other interested parties that want work done by ART members. Product managers are tactical thinkers. They look after the product- its vision, the goals of the company along with the market performance.  

The needs of their agile teams are at the forefront of product owners' minds. They're there to ensure their teams have everything they need to break down the feature they're working on into stories.

The Role of a Product Owner

The PO is available to the team, and if the PO is unable to address a query, they will seek a suitable, quick response. Product owners (common in agile organizations) are more tactical in nature. The PO also takes the strategies of the manager. They can turn them into concrete tasks. The owners can also work cross-functionally with the agile teams.  

The distribution of a product is usually the priority for product owners. To deliver products, they collaborate with a key individual such as a Product Manager or Business Line Owner. While Product Managers are in charge of a more excellent range of product functions, they must balance value creation and delivery.

The shift in roles indicates that product management is becoming recognized as a crucial component of any business. Although not a member of marketing or engineering, it is seen as a peer by all other corporate functions. Being a PM in today's world is a thrilling experience. So, to know what's the difference between product owner and product manager, you need to incorporate both roles!

In an Agile Release Train, the product manager and product owners must create a strong working relationship. Rather than knowing ‘what is the difference between product owner and product manager,’ they should work together to build a strong foundation and have an agile overview. They must be able to grasp the needs of their customers as a group. The PM is the primary point of contact with the client, and information flows from the customer to the PM, who then passes it on to the POs and their teams.

Difference Between Product Owner and Product Manager

• A product manager will manage all the needs of the user. They also ensure that what to build next is by the customers. They will make the teamwork around a product roadmap to yield better production and results.  
• A product owner is the owner of the product. He would maximize the product's value. It is done by maintaining the product backlog. All the customers’ voices are communicated with the help of the product owner.

Overall Focus

• The overall focus of the product manager is to prioritize and know what to build next. They would know what the user needs and conduct research for the same. The product manager also builds all the long-term plans and strategies. Team alignment is also their duty, along with the feature delivery. Altogether, the Product manager takes the future tasks along with the responsibilities in the product manufacturing. They are strategic and have a long-term focus.
• The product owner will maximize the value of the product. All the development team’s efforts will be considered to build the product’s value. All the backlog and grooming are the main focus of the product owner. Customer problems, managing the product development team, scrum and agile meetings, and feedback are all given by the product owner. They are detail-oriented with a short to mid-term focus.

Areas of Responsibility

• A product manager will build a vision and product strategy to deliver the best results and features to the team. With the help of in-depth research and critical insights, they have the primary responsibility to strategize the subsequent development and work towards it.  
• A product owner has the primary responsibility to do backlog grooming. They must ensure the SCRUM- Agile framework is followed and work to build and sustain complex products. They will maximize the product’s value and advocate customer needs to the development team.

Owns

• The product managers own the product roadmap and MVPS.  
• The product owner has the backlog, epics, user experiences, and stories.

Success Metrics

• The product manager should know the calculations for the NPH of the product, conversions of the product, revenue for the business, and churn for the business. They are often termed as Right Nutrition for Product Success.
• Product owners do not use metrics at complex levels and are mainly concerned with completed stories. They, however, have to use metrics related to the performance of the development team.

Scope

• Product managers are customer spokespersons. They are the ones who build a product’s vision. With their leadership skills, they can champ the team. Product managers have multidisciplinary roles along with a strategic focus. These are also called mini-CEOPs.  
• Product owners are the pens who face the customers. They work majorly with the production team and ensure the developmental processes that match the product roadmap.  

The PM will decide what to build, and PO ensures the team builds the same.  

SAFe Product Owner vs Product Manager - Skills, Jobs, and Salary 

	Product Manager	SAFe Product Owner
Skills	Highly strategic. Focused. Leadership. Communication skills. cross - team alignment and collaborative skills.	Detail- oriented and focused. Friendly and communication skills. Team collaborative skills. Agile mindset.
Jobs	Product vision with long-term focus. Customer discovery. Product Roadmap MVPS. Set priorities.	Optimise the development process. Backlog maintenance. User stories and epics. Make the development team work with customer’s needs.
Salary	$112K US dollars annually on average.	$110K US dollars annually on average.

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Do We Need Both Roles? 

The PM and PO positions are not performed by the same individual in the same agile release train, according to the SAFe structure. This ensures that their focus is not split between the demands of the team and the customer’s needs, while also allowing for regular check-ins to ensure that everyone is on the same page. In fact, Scaled Agile strongly recommends companies to undergo a SAFe POPM certification to gain insights into optimizing their team structure for enhanced success.

However, Pichler believes that these companies should develop a product manager position in the long run. To summarise, product owners and product managers are not interchangeable terms. They are two distinct functions, instead.

Conclusion 

The discussion about where a product manager's role ends and where it begins for the product owner - or whether these two roles are merely two distinct elements of the same position, will almost certainly carry on indefinitely.

It's also crucial to have this flexibility in team size depending on where your product is in the development process. If you give a Product Manager a large Scrum team's backlog to fill while you're in discovery mode, they'll keep filling it. You need excellent Product Management foundations in your firm to build products that add value to your business and customers. If you provide your employees with a career path, you must provide them with this foundation to advance to more senior positions. As a result, remind your team that they're all Product Managers. 

However, they will be torn between keeping work flowing to developers and attempting to complete the job to validate direction. As a result, neither task is completed successfully.  

What is critical is that your product organization has a team structure that supports your process and that your Product Managers and Product Owners understand their positions' responsibilities and goals. They may spend most of their time on a Scrum team as a Product Owner, but we still need them to think like a Product Manager and ensure that we are building the appropriate things. Enroll in the KnowledgeHut POPM program and get greater insights about the certification.