Scrum.org | The home of Scrum Scrum

Forum Rules of Engagement

ElegantCoder — Wed, 11 Jul 2012 02:53:04 GMT

Failure to observe the following may result in your posting privileges being suspended.

1. Be respectful of others.
2. Go easy on the foul language.
3. No spam. Don't be petty about what SPAM is, you know what it means.
4. No advertising of products or services. And don't be petty about what "products and services" are. Serve the spirit of the rule.

How to train a new development team member

Fredrik Vestin — Fri, 10 Aug 2012 00:58:25 GMT

Hi all,

A new member is joining our development team in a few weeks and I am thinking about the best way to introduce/train him. He'll need to get familiar with the code base and the overall development process.

Do you advocate pair programming (we're currently not using this) and what other methods have you used to get new members up to speed?

I'd be grateful if you would share your experiences.

Thanks
Fredrik

Scrum in Safety Industry

Daniel Tobler — Fri, 14 Sep 2012 03:53:45 GMT

I had an interesting talk over lunch with a guy developing for nuclear power plants. He likes to introduce Scrum or at least some elements. The big question he has: Are there already known examples of Software for systems under safety restrictions (nuclear power plants, medical devices, observation devices, ...) developed with Scrum? Do you have any links, documents?

Scrum Master Contract

Andrec — Thu, 27 Sep 2012 22:34:19 GMT

Hi, all I have been a tester for 13 years with vast experience in all aspects of testing and automation. Having always had a passion for agile and lived through numerous agile transitions, I recently took and passed the PSM I exam. However despite apply for numerous scrum master roles, I have yet to get an interview.

If anyway has any advice on getting a role, then I would love to hear any comments, I have also attached my linked in profile

http://www.linkedin.com/in/chrisandrews10

How to face this particular situation?

Javier Peris — Thu, 16 May 2013 00:21:54 GMT

Hi guys,

I would like to share with you a situation to hear opinions on how to resolve it.

We are in a sprint with a sprint backlog of X points. At half sprint more than the half of the functionality has been developed, however, in the daily scrum an alarm is triggered. The beginning of the implementation of a story (estimated at X / 2 points) revealed the fragility, rigidity, viscosity and immobility of the code. Team members decided that the best way to deal with this problem is reimplemented part of the core of the application, this means that the functionality can not be completed within the sprint and that the estimate assumes 3 times higher than expected. Given this situation and considering that each sprint normally ends with a new release, what attitude should have the PO?

A) Focus on the features that can be finished, release the version and abort the sprint to re-estimate the functionality that could not be done.

B) Let continue the sprint, starting to develop the reimplementation in a branch (or as the team deems appropriate) and in the new planning meeting rename and re-estimate the functionality

In any case, another question, how to explain to stakeholders a significant error and the no visual changes (redesign)?

Regards

Why does Scrum never get blamed?

P.Ross — Fri, 17 May 2013 08:31:17 GMT

How come when a waterfall project fails its because of waterfall and when a Scrum project fails its not because of Scrum?

Activities for improving backlog refinement that work remotely

Ryan Cromwell — Thu, 16 May 2013 05:16:25 GMT

I'm working with a highly distributed team that struggles with backlog decomposition; breaking down big things. Much of this comes from not understanding the business and that's being resolved through industry training, etc.

I'm curious, though. Are there retrospective or training activities that you've found helpful in learning how to decompose that might work well for a distributed team? Something that works well in a collocated scenario that might be modified.

I understand all of the problems with distributed teams and that this causes problems. I'm not interested in that particular discussion being repeated.

Looking for a tool to use Scrum

Shweta — Tue, 07 May 2013 08:29:29 GMT

Hi,

I have worked with scrum in my last project about two years back where we used a tool called scrumworks to maintain our backlog, stories and sprint tasks. It also helped us to fill in our guesstimations and track our daily hours for our sprint tasks.

I am now trying to start scrum for another project and looking for some similar tool to help me out, preferably an open source tool . Anyone having any pointers for the same would be appreciable.

Thanks.

If not user stories, then what?

randyh — Tue, 09 Apr 2013 20:51:08 GMT

Although many teams use user stories to plan out the increments of software they are working towards, the scrum guide does not specifically say anything about user stories.

If a team were not to utilize user stories, what alternatives would they have? Are there any other viable alternatives to user stories?

How to estimate and create items with zero domain knowledge?

P.Ross — Mon, 20 May 2013 21:23:05 GMT

Hi all,

I'm currently working as a Program Manager in a company that is adopting Scrum. When a project starts we usually hire consultants to help us out.

What I see and hear it's that most team have trouble during the Sprint planning meetings. Estimating items relatively is going ok as in the team does eventually come to a consensus but when it comes to creating tasks, teams tend to have problems. My company creates a very specific product in-house and every project is actually an extra module on top of the existing product. So it's very hard for our developers to create tasks as they don't know the existing product.

Usually during the Sprint planning meeting I hear a lot of "no idea, no idea how the backend system works or sorry but we can't estimate this".

How do you guys deal with these kind of problems?

Dynamic length of sprints in Scrum

Ztere0 — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 05:31:21 GMT

I have been working several projects with Scrum method and, in some, we have taken the decision of execute Scrum sprints of dynamic length (base the Sprint length in the work inside every Sprint, and not fixed length).

For me it have some advantages:

Adapt the Sprint length to the "real" work charge by Sprint (always respecting the Sprint min-max duration rules).
More simple planification of Sprint (not have to "play with" the end of the Sprint to fix the lenght)
Easy to adapt complete functionalities in short planifications.
The main dis-advantage is that feedback to the client is sent in variable time spaces, but if they are informed and confortable with this, there are no problem.

Is this an accepted practice in the Scrum method?

Why pulling x amount of PBI into the Sprint based on Velocity?

P.Ross — Sun, 12 May 2013 01:10:22 GMT

Hi all,

Just thinking out loud…

Why should a team always pull in the right amount of Product Backlog Items (PBI) into their Sprints based on their velocity? Why not just pull in all the PBI’s that are fine-grained (according to a Definition of Ready if the team has one) and see how much can be done within a Sprint? Based on what is complete, the team adjust the planning.

What would be the downside of this way of working?

Cheers, Pablo

Relative Complexity Theory: how User Story estimations will autocorrect itself after x SprintsRelative Complexity Theory: how estimations will autocorrect itself

Chee-Hong Hsia — Sun, 12 May 2013 02:05:49 GMT

Dear Agile fans,

I would like to share with you guys a small "research" that I've been working on couple week ago. Wanted to publish it earlier, but couldn't find the right time due to work etc.

The subject is about Relative Complexity Theory and how the teams guestimation will eventually autocorrect itself after x Sprints.

I must say, after I wrote this I go into the Sprint Planning Meetings with a totally different mindset.

http://relativecomplexitytheory.blogspot.nl/2013/05/relative-complexity-theory-how-user.html

Hope it makes any sense! :D

difficulty managing multiple scrum teams

jbeek — Sat, 27 Apr 2013 18:07:23 GMT

do you have experience or insight into managing multiple scrum teams. I know we should have a single product backlog we work from. not sure if I can have multiple teams working their own separate sprints with separate timelines/timeboxes or everyone should have same product backlog and their respective sprints should start / end at the same time?

anyone experienced with multiple teams?

Updating estimates during a Sprint

Ian Mitchell — Fri, 10 May 2013 00:31:26 GMT

Hi all

Page 14 of the Scrum Guide says:

"The Development Team modifies Sprint Backlog throughout the Sprint, and the Sprint Backlog emerges during the Sprint"..."As new work is required, the Development Team adds it to the Sprint Backlog. As work is
performed or completed, the estimated remaining work is updated."

Perhaps there are at least two ways to interpret this:

1) the estimates (e.g. story points) for all remaining work should be updated during the Sprint, even for those stories that have already been estimated.
2) only the new work being brought in is estimated. The estimates for the work already planned in will not be changed. The calculation of remaining work will be based on these figures.

The advantage of (1) is that the estimated points reflect the truth as it is currently understood. Therefore if they are written on the story cards on a Scrum board, the information radiator will be telling the truth. By the end of the Sprint they will be very close to the actuals. The disadvantage is that better estimation (and therefore analysis) during planning is potentially discouraged, since the team know they can always change the estimates as they go along.

The advantage of (2) is that there is a clear inspect/adapt opportunity at the end of the Sprint to improve estimation (and analysis) during planning for the next Sprint. The disadvantage is that the board is less honest, because it will be showing story point estimates that do not best reflect the truth as it is currently understood.

Many teams adopt a compromise approach whereby tasks are broken out for each user story, and only the estimates (often in hours) are updated. By the end of the Sprint the task estimates will effectively be actuals. However the story points themselves will not be amended.

What are your opinions on the best way to update estimates during a Sprint?

who manages burn down charts

jbeek — Sat, 27 Apr 2013 18:01:39 GMT

who is best to manage product backlog burndown charts including tracking? Product owner?

who is best to manage sprint backlog burndown charts including tracking? Dev team?

since scrum master is a management position but doesn't manage team then can the scrum master "track" each burndown chart for the team to manage?

Best Scrum Master certification having great value in market

Vikas Gupta — Thu, 02 May 2013 01:31:51 GMT

Hi All,

Just would like to know the best and great Scrum master certification among the options available in market. I am interested to do Scrum Master certification and want to pick the one which have best reputation in software world.

Thanks
Vikas Gupta

dev team member needs to be removed

jbeek — Sat, 27 Apr 2013 18:04:02 GMT

I have a dev team member that is causing problems with the rest of the team and needs to be removed. should I as the scrum master who is a management position for removing impediments remove the individual? or should the dev team who is self managing remove the individual?

The DoD and Scrum artifacts

otembajelle — Wed, 01 May 2013 02:28:59 GMT

The Scrum Guide lists the Product Backlog and the Sprint Backlog as its two Scrum artifacts. The Definition of Done is not an artifact. I was wondering if anyone has thought about that?

Other parts of the Scrum Guide say: "Scrum users must frequently inspect scrum artifacts ..". The Definition of Done is also a subject of continuous inspection. Apparently it shares properties with the Scrum artifacts especially its need for transparency.

I assume that the Scrum Guide is a result of inspection itself. Would you be willing to consider the Definition of Done as an artifact? Why am I asking you?

In my daily practice I noticed that occasionally Items of the Product Backlog are in fact requirements. In the Sprint Planning Items wander from the Product Backlog to the Sprint Backlog. According to https://www.scrum.org/Resources/Scrum-Glossary/Definition-of-Done the Sprint Planning Meeting is also the occasion to inspect the Definition of Done:

"During the Sprint Planning meeting, the Scrum Team develops or reconfirms its DoD, which enables the Development Team to know how much work to select for a given Sprint."

That statement confirms the close relationship of the Definition of Done with the Scrum artifacts. I assume that the authors of the Scrum Guide have been considering this too. What made them decide against the thought that the DoD is not a Scrum artifact?

Scrum master certification without attending class room training.

raghu — Fri, 03 May 2013 06:24:21 GMT

Hi guys,

I am trying to find out is there anyway, can we get Scrum master certification without attending class room training i.e through self-study or by attending video training for example CBT nugget provides online video training.

Please advice.

Many thanks.