In a recent podcast conversation with Cory Shields, Lead Engineer at augustwenty, we unpacked a topic that sits at the very heart of successful engineering consulting—but doesn’t always get the airtime it deserves: understanding and delivering on the needs of the product owner.

Cory’s take was refreshingly simple: the best consultants are not just the smartest people in the room or the most up-to-date on frameworks—they’re the ones who listen deeply, understand the true problem, and then execute with empathy and clarity.

It was a reminder that in consulting, success isn’t measured by the complexity of your codebase—it’s measured by your ability to align with the person driving the vision, and help make that vision real.

Let’s walk through what that looks like in practice.

1. Identify the Product Owner

This might sound obvious, but it’s often overlooked—who is the product owner?

Who actually owns the vision? Who will define what “done” means? Who carries the weight of the business outcome?

Sometimes, the answer is straightforward: it’s the CEO, the Head of Product, or a clear project lead. But in many real-world projects—especially complex or enterprise environments—it’s not always that clean.

You may find yourself working with multiple stakeholders who each have strong opinions. Some might outrank others, but lack day-to-day context. Others might be hands-on, but have no authority to make final calls.

As a consultant, your job is to sift through the noise and identify the true source of direction—not just who speaks the loudest, but who holds the decision-making power. If you don’t know who that is, you’re flying blind.

Getting this right avoids costly detours and conflicting guidance later. It centers the project around a single, aligned source of truth.

2. Listen to Understand, Not to Reply

Once you’ve found the product owner, your next move is deceptively hard: stop talking and start listening.

Not just nodding along. Not waiting your turn to speak. But actually listening—with the goal of understanding what this person values, fears, and hopes for.

• What’s the real problem they’re trying to solve?
• What constraints are they facing—budget, timeline, team bandwidth, stakeholder politics?
• What does success look like in their world?

And just as importantly: what don’t they care about?

Great consultants know that product owners won’t always speak in clean user stories or technical specs. They may ramble, or change their mind mid-sentence. That’s okay. Your job is to listen beneath the surface—to tune into the why behind the what.

When you listen like this, you stop being just a service provider. You become a thought partner. You build trust. And that trust becomes the foundation for everything that follows.

3. Translate Needs into Solutions

Now comes the part consultants love: solving the problem.

But not just any solution—the right one. One that threads the needle between ambition and feasibility, between business need and technical reality.

This is where the engineering skills matter. But only in service to the goal—not as an end unto themselves.

The product owner might want a full-featured solution tomorrow. Or ask for something that would blow the budget in a week. Your job isn’t just to say yes or no—it’s to find a path forward that honors the goal, respects the constraints, and delivers something that works.

That could mean proposing a phased release. Or rethinking a feature to deliver value faster. Or building just enough scaffolding for the team to learn and adjust.

This is the craft of consulting: knowing when to push back, when to compromise, and when to go heads-down and deliver.

4. Communication Is Ongoing

Even after you've kicked off the work, your role as a consultant doesn't end with a plan.

In fact, some of the most critical work happens in the middle of the project—communicating clearly and consistently as things evolve.

Requirements shift. Priorities change. New information comes in. The worst thing you can do is go quiet and assume everything is still aligned.

Keep the product owner close. Share updates, even when they're messy. Surface risks before they become blockers. Ask for clarity when the vision gets fuzzy.

In consulting, communication is not a task—it’s an operating system.

When you get this right, you reduce rework, increase velocity, and build credibility that compounds over time.

5. Delivering Value, Not Just Solutions

There’s a huge difference between delivering what was asked and delivering what’s valuable.

Good consultants hit the checklist. Great consultants see around corners.

They spot the bottleneck before it becomes a fire drill. They recommend a small refactor that saves weeks later. They say, “What if we did this instead?” and suddenly, the solution gets better for everyone.

This is the kind of value that builds long-term client relationships. That makes product owners say, “I want them on every project.” That turns consulting from transactional to transformational.

If you want to stand out—not just get hired, but get invited back—focus on value. Always.

Conclusion

Engineering consulting is not just about the architecture, or the code, or the tools.

At its core, it’s about people. Specifically, about helping one person—the product owner—turn their vision into something real.

That starts by identifying who they are. Then listening, deeply. Then translating that understanding into technical execution. Then communicating clearly, and always staying aligned. And finally, by adding value wherever you can.

Do that well, and you’ll become more than a consultant. You’ll become a trusted partner. The kind of person every product owner wants on their team.

And that, ultimately, is the essence of consulting.