Employee stories: Michael, Product Owner for items in JTL-Wawi

I think I started as the seventh employee back then. That was over ten years ago. Contact with JTL came about through a former employee who is a friend of my father. He was responsible for looking after the JTL forum and was the first support employee, so to speak. Because the number of inquiries kept increasing, he needed support at some point.

I was actually interested in a job as a developer. During the interview, however, it quickly became clear that they didn’t use the programming languages I was proficient in at the time. “Now you can go straight back home,” I thought. During the interview, however, the phone kept ringing and at some point they asked me: “Can you talk to customers?” And I said: “Sure!” Thanks to my training at Telekom as a systems electronics technician, I actually had a lot of experience here, as I had looked after a lot of customers in the field.

Basically, yes! When we started out as a small company, we didn’t have traditional sales either, so I sold licenses for our shop system JTL-Shop in addition to customer support. That sold like hotcakes back then! After I had been working in support for a while, we started to build up documentation, i.e. the JTL-Guide. Because I had a very good customer perspective, I got involved here.

We simply wanted to pick up the “lazy readers” from the growing user community and therefore launched a YouTube channel. First, we completed a training course to familiarize ourselves with the topic of video editing. This gave us a solid basis for setting up the channel. I then also recorded the video texts.

I think it was because I complained a lot (laughs). Joking aside – because I was very familiar with the operating paths of our products through my documentation work, I automatically questioned them and thought: Why is it so complicated? We need to invest a lot more time in the usability of our software and need clear guidelines. I communicated this to the development team and it often led to heated discussions.

But the Managing Directors reacted very constructively at the time. They biddered me to move to Development – specifically to the Quality Assurance department, or QA as we call it today. In this new position, I then worked with my colleagues to improve the user guidance of our products. At the time, this essentially involved the tasks of a product owner today. As the specialist areas within Development gradually became more differentiated, I came to my current Product Owner role.

It ensures that the planned requirements of our solutions are implemented within a realistic timeframe and budget. We work with the Scrum process in so-called sprint cycles. When we develop new features, the question always arises: will it make many customers happy or is it more useful for a specific user group? Are they large or small customers? Which industries do they serve? I have to evaluate all these questions so that I can decide whether and when a feature should be implemented. Product owners therefore set the direction for their development team and prioritize projects in terms of scalability and profitability.

You don’t have to be able to program perfectly, but you should be able to estimate how long a developer needs for a ticket or how complex something is in development. Despite all the technical knowledge, it is also important to be able to put on customer glasses. Organizational and team skills are also of central importance.

In the morning, I check our queue in the issue tracker and prioritize the tickets. During the day, I consult with my team on the most important issues at the moment. In the afternoon, I either coordinate with teams from other areas of the company or plan sprints and take care of QA. From time to time, I take time for more in-depth analysis and look at solutions from other companies, for example, in order to think outside the box.

That my area of responsibility is so varied and that I can organize my work flexibly. If I need to, I can go for an hour’s walk to clear my head and continue working later. Of course, there are also times when things have to be done quickly or problems have to be solved, but overall JTL places a lot of trust in its employees. I also really appreciate the teamwork and team spirit. We maintain open and honest communication. When there is a challenge, we all pull together.

I have been playing the piano for about five years. I taught myself the instrument. It’s a wonderful way to balance out my PC work. I prefer to play classical pieces, which can also be a little more challenging, such as Nocturne op. 9 no. 2 by Chopin. “Magic the Gathering” is also one of my top leisure activities, a collectible card game that I’ve been playing for over 20 years. I have older cards that are very valuable. The game requires strategic thinking, but also creativity and patience. I can really lose myself in it.