Should I Pursue Certified Scrum Product Owner (CSPO) Certification?

As mentioned in a previous post on the value of Scrum certifications , I became a Certified Scrum Product Owner (CSPO) in May 2011, some thirteen years after I first engaged with Scrum. The reasons as to the delay in gaining certification were outlined in the previous article. But why CSPO certification? Why not Certified ScrumMaster (CSM)? CSM is, by far, the most popular entry certification available from the Scrum Alliance. This might be because, if you have only a nodding acquaintance with Scrum then it’s the one new role that you will almost certainly have come across. The Product Owner role is also the newest one in Scrum. The ScrumMaster and Development Team member roles have always been there. To be honest, if I had applied for certification in the early years of the Scrum Alliance then I, too, would probably have opted for CSM. ScrumMaster was the role I played first when using Scrum, and is still the one I’ve played most in Scrum Teams I’ve been involved with. I have since added CSM to my CSPO and Certified Scrum Professional qualifications, by the way – so it is not because I have underrated the ScrumMaster role in any way.

So why was CSPO certification my first choice? My main reason for becoming a CSPO was that I had realized in the interim, when Agile entered the mainstream, that for Scrum to be sustainable over time the Product Owner role is probably the most important one to get right.

Is the CSPO the “One Wringable Neck”?

As far back as 2007 in his book The Enterprise and Scrum , Ken Schwaber had written about the Product Owner having the “one wringable neck” in the Scrum Team. I don’t think for one moment that he was suggesting that the Scrum Team as a whole was not collectively responsible for the success of their product. A team wins together and loses together, as any team sports coach worth his or her salt will tell you. Schwaber was, however, trying to draw attention to the special responsibilities of the Product Owner within the Scrum team. Let’s list them briefly.

Read more at http://blog.learningtree.com/uk/should-i-pursue-cspo-certification/