IBM Product Owner

The Scrum-adjacent role of deciding what gets built

Where a Scrum Master runs the process, a Product Owner decides what belongs on the backlog in the first place — and this IBM Professional Certificate is built specifically around that decision-making role. It covers backlog prioritization, stakeholder communication, and the agile ceremonies a product owner actually sits in.

Core skills

• Backlog management and prioritization techniques
• Product strategy and agile product development
• Sprint planning and retrospectives from the product-owner seat
• Stakeholder engagement and meeting facilitation

The program is explicitly geared toward the PSPO I certification, giving learners an external benchmark to prepare for. Set at beginner level, it assumes no prior product background. With 12,300+ students enrolled, it's a tightly scoped program for anyone moving from delivery into product decision-making.