Meaning
The Scrum team role responsible for maximizing the value of the product, managing the backlog, and clarifying user stories for developers.
Three examples from work
Backlog refinement
POLet's review the user stories for the subscription renewal flow.
DevCould you clarify the edge case where payment fails twice?
Story acceptance
DevThe export filter is ready on staging for acceptance testing.
POI validated all acceptance criteria; moving the card to Done.
Sprint trade-offs
LeadWe don't have enough capacity for both analytics and notification settings.
POPrioritize notification settings; customer support is receiving urgent requests.
Commonly abbreviated as 'PO'. The Product Owner is the tactical proxy for the customer on the agile engineering team.