Product Owner: What is the cost of hiring?

What is a Product Owner?

A Product Owner typically works as part of a product management or Scrum team, collaborating closely with developers and designers. Their core responsibility is managing the product backlog to ensure features are prioritized effectively and the final product meets customer needs. They may also act as a liaison, helping the development team enhance the product to maximize its value for customers.

Why hire a Product Owner

Product Owners help your team deliver customer-focused solutions by turning insights and business goals into clear development priorities. They can improve communication and collaboration between departments, keep teams aligned with the product vision and ensure features are built in order of impact. Your business might benefit if you’re managing multiple stakeholders, facing delivery delays or struggling to incorporate user feedback effectively.

Contributions of a great Product Owner:

• Clear prioritization of backlog items to guide development teams
• Better alignment between customer needs and product features
• More efficient delivery of updates through Agile workflows

Defining your hiring needs for a Product Owner

As you decide how to hire a Product Owner, defining your hiring needs helps guide the selection process. Identify whether the role should be full-time, part-time or freelance based on your product roadmap and team structure. 

Clarify whether the position will focus on a specific product, platform or initiative, and consider how the role will collaborate with developers, UX teams and business leaders in Agile environments. Related roles include Product Manager and Business Analyst, which may be a better fit depending on your organization’s goals and structure.

What are the types of Product Owners?

Product Owners can focus on different layers or scopes of the product depending on your organization’s structure and goals. Common types include:

• Feature Owners: Manage the development and delivery of specific product features, ensuring alignment with user needs and business goals.
• Platform Owners: Oversee a shared platform used across multiple products or services with a focus on scalability, integration and internal stakeholder needs.
• Component Owners: Manage a single product element, such as the user interface, API or data pipeline, demonstrating deep subject matter expertise. Unlike Feature Owners, who typically focus on user-facing functionality, Component Owners are often responsible for more technical or internal-facing aspects of the product.
• Portfolio Owners: Coordinate priorities across multiple related products, often in large organizations with complex product ecosystems.
• SAFe Product Owners: Operate within the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe), concentrating on tactical execution while aligning with higher-level product strategies.

When writing your Product Owner job description, consider including some or all of the following keywords to improve the visibility of your job posting. These are the most popular search terms leading to clicks on Product Owner jobs, according to Indeed data:

• Product Owner
• Product Manager
• Business Analyst
• Associate Product Manager
• Scrum Master
• Agile Product Owner
• Product Analyst
• Technical Product Owner
• Product Management

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Where to find a Product Owner

Product Owners can be found through tech and product-focused job boards, professional associations, Agile communities and product management training programs. Attending product meetups, networking at Agile or Scrum conferences or connecting with universities that offer product management certificates can help expand your candidate pool. 

To find the right Product Owner for your business, consider trying out a few different recruiting strategies:

• Internal promotions: Identify product team members who demonstrate transferable skills such as cross-functional communication, backlog grooming, sprint planning or translating business needs into technical requirements.
• Tech-focused recruiting firms: Agencies that specialize in product and Agile roles may already have qualified Product Owners in their talent pipeline, especially for contract or urgent hires.
• Agile communities and organizations: Groups like Scrum Alliance or SAFe Community of Practice offer job boards, forums and networking events where you can connect with experienced professionals.
• Post your job online: Try posting your Product Owner job on Indeed to find and attract qualified candidates.

Skills to look for in a Product Owner

A successful Product Owner candidate will typically have the following skills and competencies, which may be gained through various experiences, training or education:

• Ability to navigate Agile frameworks like Scrum or SAFe, gained through team experience, training or relevant certifications
• Technical skills in software development, product development architecture and coding to communicate more effectively with developers
• Strong cross-functional skills, product intuition and the ability to translate user needs into actionable requirements
• Familiarity with using Agile project management platforms, like Jira and Azure DevOps, to manage the product backlog and prioritize backlog items
• Ability to collect and translate user stories using software such as ProductPlan or Lucidchart to develop the product vision
• Understanding of the product development life cycle, starting with idea generation and market research

Writing a Product Owner job description

Now that you know the key skills, salary expectations, popular job seeker search terms and hiring insights for a Product Owner, you’re ready to write a job description.

A Product Owner job description typically includes a compelling summary of the role, a detailed list of duties and responsibilities and the required and preferred skills for the position. You may also want to include information about your company culture, benefits and perks to attract candidates to your open role.

Ready to get started? See our full guide for writing Product Owner job descriptions.

Interviewing Product Owner Candidates

Strong candidates for Product Owner positions will be confident answering questions about:

• Stages of the product development lifecycle
• Liaising between users and the development team regarding product features and functionality
• Skill in gathering user feedback and translating it into clear, actionable product features
• The ability to prioritize backlog items effectively, even when team members have conflicting needs
• Prioritizing and managing the product backlog
• Translating user stories into actionable development tasks 
• Procedures within various Agile frameworks, such as Scrum