How To Choose An Owner For a Cross-Organization Initiative

Reader Kevin had this question about Cross-Product Initiative Ownership:
​_“How should we choose an Initiative (or Epic) Owner when multiple parts of the organization will be responsible for delivery?”_

That is a good question that often comes up in the trenches when I’m helping organizations apply product-oriented agile thinking to cross-organization initiatives.

Here’s how I think about it: Initiative Ownership is about the Why and the What more than the How.

Ask yourself - who is the best person to:

• Act as a visionary for their strategic initiative.

• Own the Outcomes

• Connect to customers

• Collaborate with a multitude of teams on finding creative and effective ways to test and deliver outcomes.

• Make critical decisions and decentralize when possible while providing clarity and context.

• Focus on the risks/uncertainties and create discovery and delivery plans that provide ample opportunity to inspect, adapt, or stop.

• Leverage influence to drive collaboration towards outcomes across multiple products and departments.

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Want a shortcut? Cross-product initiatives often have a “lead” organization closest to the outcomes we’re trying to unlock.

The Initiative Owner often comes from that organization. Even if other teams have more work to enable/deliver the desired outcomes.

PS I’ve spent quite a bit of time in recent months training and coaching Initiative/Epic Owners on moving from project/delivery focus to product and evidence-based thinking. If that sounds interesting, let’s chat…