What does the Product Owner ensure about the Product Backlog during Sprint Planning?

The Product Owner plays a crucial role in ensuring that the Product Backlog is effectively managed, particularly during Sprint Planning. One of their primary responsibilities is to prioritize the items in the backlog. By prioritizing, the Product Owner helps the team understand which items are of the highest value and should be worked on first. This prioritization is based on factors such as stakeholder needs, market demands, and the overall goals of the product.

It is essential for the team to focus on the most important tasks to deliver value as early as possible. Prioritization not only guides the Sprint Planning process but also influences the entire development cycle, ensuring that the team is aligned on delivering incremental and impactful improvements.

The other options do not reflect the primary focus of the Product Owner during Sprint Planning. While a complete and exhaustive backlog can be beneficial, it is not practical or necessary for the backlog to contain every conceivable item, as this may lead to analysis paralysis. Similarly, having a fixed number of items or treating all items as equally important undermines the purpose of prioritization, which is to maximize value delivery. Therefore, ensuring that the items are prioritized correctly is the most vital responsibility of the Product Owner during this phase.