POM for IT – roles and responsibilities

This page details the core roles of Atlassian’s IT product teams, including the overall responsibilities, and outputs. Note that this is our starting point: each role will need additional review and fine-tuning as we move forward.

Core team roles

Each product team will have a combination of the roles identified below. In some cases, these roles will be dedicated, in other cases, they will be shared among multiple product teams.

Within each product, there is a team that will be continuously responsible for the end-to-end lifecycle of the product, including:

Developing the product strategy/vision in alignment with desired outcomes
Delivering against the product including development/configuration
Operating, measuring, and enhancing the product
Maintaining the product lifecycle in line with the product vision

By creating dedicated, balanced teams with business, design, engineering, and operations principles we will establish end-to-end accountability.

Every team will most likely have a set of core team roles which are the Product Manager, Product Analysts (replacing the traditional Business Systems Analyst role), Engineers/Developers, as well as someone that plays the Scrum Master role. Most teams will also have supporting roles related to functions like architecture, data and analytics, program management, UI/UX, or change management.

What is each role responsible for?

Note that these are roles and not necessarily HR titles.

Role	Responsibilities	Decisions made	Outputs

Role	Responsibilities	Decisions made	Outputs
Group PM	Partners with business and Product Managers to define and articulate business vision and roadmap, including prioritization of strategic priorities and business needs for the Product Group Defines and owns shared business outcomes, KPIs, business case/value case, and drives alignment on Objectives with IT teams Focuses on Product Group business strategy and outcome, and acts as an advocate for business solutions Accepts sprint deliverables and product/feature roadmap priorities Drives alignment and decision-making within business and other Group PMs along with operational execution	Near term: GPMs should be constantly working with the business and educating PMs to ensure delivery is completed and product is adopted GPMs can be policy owners, process owners, data stewards, compliance owners, etc. with each having slightly different outcomes	Business vision and Product Group roadmap Business requirements Business outcomes, OKRs, and KPIs User acceptance testing scripts
Product Manager	Acts as the voice of the customer Accountable for the product vision, product roadmap, budget, and performance, including product features and capabilities Works with business partners to define business user stories/requirements, and aligns stakeholders to product vision/objectives Responsible for obtaining acceptance of epic and sprint deliverables Accountable for driving adoption and change Monitors the market and developing competitive landscape	Near term: Sits in IT PMs work together to manage and coordinate business requirements within their Product Group and across Product Groups Mature PMs don't require dedicated process definition; fits in architecture for the enterprise process In some cases, BSAs/Product Analysts will be more like “junior” PMs and act as the support, analyst and process specialist/design on the team Longer term: Where possible, elevate BSAs/Product Analysts to Product Managers To be addressed: Accountability when multiple Product Managers exist within a team	Product vision and tech roadmap Product business case and features User stories Change mgmt and/or adoption plan
Technical Lead	Accountable for the overall implementation of the solution within their direct reports Lead and oversee the work of direct reports resources and remove technical or resource impediments. Work with Product Analysts to review/refine requirements Collaborate with the Solution Architect to review/finalize the defined architecture Take business strategic direction from the Product Manager Ensure team moral and performance are kept at optimal levels For support based team, ensure that Atlassian’s support needs are being met appropriately	Current team leads would fit into this role if they don’t transition into a PM role Tech Leads would partner with PMs to ensure their teams have the resources and capabilities to build and support products, as well as determine time frames for deployment
Engineer	Engineers include data, development, integration, network, etc., with each having slightly different skillsets and technology experience Develops a robust and reusable code (configure, extend, integrate, automate) Maintains and improves existing codebases and peer review code changes Troubleshoots software issues and fixes bugs as needed Investigates utilization of new technologies (including open source) where appropriate Analyzes the customer and business needs, and estimates technical user stories Responsible for providing written knowledge transfer material (and documentation on Confluence when necessary) Responsible for automated testing and deployment of product	Near term: Leverage product engineering job description if possible Longer term: Prioritize hiring for full stack developers and supplement exceptions if/when needed (configurators, etc.)	Technical user stories Non-functional requirements (incl. security, data, etc.) Code and testing docs
IT App Developer	Understand client requirements and how they translate to new application features Collaborate with development team and other IT staff to set specifications for new applications Create high-quality code to program complete applications on schedule Conduct functional and non-functional testing Troubleshoot and debug applications Evaluate existing applications to reprogram, update and add new features Develop technical documents and handbooks to accurately represent application design and code		Application design and code
System Engineer	Manage and monitor all installed systems and infrastructure Install, configure, test, and maintain operating systems, application software, and system management tools Monitor and test application performance for potential bottlenecks, identify possible solutions, and work with developers to implement those fixes Maintain security, backup, and redundancy strategies Write and maintain custom scripts to increase system efficiency and lower the human intervention time on any tasks Participate in the design of information and operational support systems Provide 2nd and 3rd level support Liaise with vendors and other IT personnel for problem resolution		Testing and system upkeep docs Code used for system automation and efficiency
Architect	Enterprise Architect (EA): Understands business vision, strategy, and drives multi-year architecture/technology roadmap across business capability domains Understands current state architecture and recommends improvements to future state architecture Build relationships and engage with business and technology leaders, and customers, ensuring architecture and business alignment, evangelizing architecture recommendations Establish architecture practices, governance and standards to be leveraged across the IT organization Manage application portfolio inventory, while identifying opportunities for efficiencies and business value Engage with stakeholders and solution architects to promote and govern reference architectures Deliver multi-year roadmaps, product grouping-level architectures and reference models, enterprise standards and practices Business Architect (BA): Creating business architecture models that reflect strategies and goals (e.g. business capabilities models, value chain models) Understands current state architecture & recommends improvements to future state architecture Build relationships and trust with business leaders, and customers, ensuring architecture is aligned with business strategy and value outcomes Establish architecture practices, governance and standards to be leveraged across the IT organization Manage capability and process models and inventories, while identifying opportunities for efficiency Engage with business stakeholders and enterprise architects to align business strategy with technology execution Deliver multi-year roadmaps, business frameworks and models (capability, process, etc.) Solution Architect (SA): Responsible for end-to-end cross-functional system design and communication Drive alignment towards end-state target architecture Performing technology assessment and comparison to decide on projects’ technology stack Ensure meeting requirements from both non-technical & technical stakeholders Account for project constraints (e.g., technology, risks, cost, quality, time, resources for solution architecture and design) Ensure solutions are compliant with functional and non-functional requirements Collaborate with Product Analysts in defining, analyzing and documenting solution requirements Deliver near-term roadmaps, product-level architectures and reference models, and solution assessments	Near term: EAs are aligned to the central team acting not just in a consultative manner, but also helping drive architectural deliverables, be involved in backlog grooming process, and work to design for scale SAs should be aligned to product teams, functions, services, where possible SAs that demonstrate expertise working on multiple functions are senior level Longer term: EAs will assume some responsibility for security architecture EAs should have multi-domain, multi-solution experience and will be more senior SAs may act as Product Analysts in cases where PAs do not exist	EA: Roadmaps and initiative definition (end-to-end technology level) Application portfolio management and reporting Conceptual models Business capability models Architecture standards & patterns Technology research and reporting Solution technology assessments BA: Roadmaps and initiative definition (business capability level) Capability and process inventories (Lean IX) Business process modeling standards Enterprise business capability model Business value chains SA: Roadmaps and initiative definition (platform & solution level) Application portfolio (Lean IX) Logical and physical models Solution design artifacts Solution technology assessments Domain application portfolio data management
Product Analyst (formerly Business Systems Analyst)	Responsible for process-oriented and design work Designs, transforms, modifies and evaluates different systems to ensure compatibility and users’ efficiency and effectiveness Works on configuration items Conduct regular systems and operations maintenance Turns user requirements into a set of functional specifications Coordinate, simplify, verify, and manage business requirements	Near term: We’ll retain some small pockets of BSAs in service-oriented teams	Project requirement analysis Business and user research
Program Manager	Understand feature-level dependencies across product teams, and factor dependencies into overall approach to feature delivery Drive alignment between scrum masters and sprints within an initiative Help define charter, business process design, and solution for the program Manage risks, issues, communications, and budget related to programs Set and monitor metrics	Near term: Scrum master will be aligned at team level, whereas PgM will be aligned at portfolio level No significant need for Technical Program Managers at this point (subject to change) To be addressed: Differentiate between Technical PgM and PgM	Dependency and risk clearance Program charter, business process design, and solution Communications plan Program metrics Status reports

SUPPLEMENTAL TEAM ROLES: Each product team may also include roles that are played by existing members of the team and/or shared from other teams, as is the case for UX.

Role	Responsibilities	Decisions Made	Outputs

Role	Responsibilities	Decisions Made	Outputs
Scrum Master	Rotating responsibility shared by product team Manages sprints and removes blockers on the teams Acts as the Atlassian product and practices expert on tools and process Facilitates team meetings, sprint planning, status reporting, and retrospectives Responsible for ensuring the team is functional and productive, coaching the team along the way Runs product acceptance reviews with business partners Onboards team members and vendors Focuses on the measurement process and continues to try to improve practices over time	Near term: Scrum Master is a role, not a resource (to be played by different members e.g. Engineer, etc.) In some cases, we will build internally for core products and or large programs Other scrum masters can be contractors and will flex up/down depending on need and size of project	Agile practice guidelines Acceptance reviews, status reports, and retrospective docs
Data Analytics	Includes analysts and data engineers as their responsibilities are different from non-data roles Defines data requirements and dependencies Analysts build dashboards and KPIs, and maintain and report on metrics Also builds and maintains dashboards for the business		Data requirements Dashboard
UX	UX includes information architecture Ensure usability for the product/service end users will experience Design and develop the UI and interconnected UX Lead user research and focus groups when necessary	Near term: UX roles will be leveraged from other parts of the organization in product teams when necessary Discuss UX needs in team and communicate the ask early	Product wireframes User research
Communications	Applies OCM process and tools to create a strategy to support adoption of the changes required by the change initiative Identify impacted stakeholders (conduct impact analysis and assess change readiness) Assess requirements and support the design and delivery of training programs and management of comms	This is not a specific role but rather a split responsibility between PM and PgM	Impact analysis Change documents