Scrum Guide Core Concepts

Question 1

What is Scrum?

Answer 1

Scrum is a framework that people use to address highly complex and adaptive problems, in terms of software development, it is to produce products with the highest possible value.

Question 2

What is Scrum decidedly NOT?

Answer 2

Scrum is not a set technique, method, or tactic. It is a way of thinking and a way of approaching complex issues and products, a set of values.

Question 3

What is the Scrum framework consist of?

Answer 3

It is consisted of a scrum team of people, each with defined roles, rules they abide by, artifacts they produce, events that they participate in.

Question 4

What is at the core of Scrum, the essence of it?

Answer 4

It is a small highly adaptive and flexible team of people. T

Question 5

What are the pillars behind Scrum Theory?

Answer 5

Transparency, inspection, adaptation.

Question 6

What does Transparency mean?

Answer 6

The people responsible for the outcome or the product must be able to see all relevant aspects of the process.

• A common language so everyone shares common understanding.
• A common standard or definition of done, so those doing the work and those inspecting the work is on the same page.

Question 7

What does Inspection mean?

Answer 7

The work being produced during a sprint must be frequently inspected to see if it has undesirable variances. Is it going off track? is it still progressing towards the sprint goal?
Inspection should be done by skilled inspectors and not so frequent that it gets in the way.

Question 8

What does Adaptation mean?

Answer 8

When an inspector finds that something is deviating outside of acceptable limits,or what’s being created isn’t on track anymore or may be unusable, it must be addressed and adjusted as soon as it is detected.

Question 9

What are the Scrum values?

Answer 9

Commitment, Courage, Focus, Openness, Respect

Question 10

What are the roles within a Scrum team?

Answer 10

There’s a Product Owner, Scrum Master and Development Team

Question 11

What is the Product Owner responsible for?

Answer 11

The PO is responsible for maximizing the value of the product being produce by the team.

• Solely responsible for the Product backlog
• Clear expression of items within the product backlog.
• Prioritizing backlog items to best achieve goals.
• Optimising value of dev team work.
• Ensure items are visible, transparent and provide enough detail to the level needed by dev team.

PO can delegate out the above tasks but remains accountable.

Question 12

What is the Development team responsible for?

Answer 12

Dev team is a team of professionals who do the work of delivering an increment of “done” product at end of each sprint.
- Only members of the dev team create the increment.

Question 13

What is the Scrum Master responsible for?

Answer 13

The Scrum Master is responsible for promoting and supporting the scrum framework by helping everyone understand the theory, rules, and help facilitate scrum events.

Question 14

What are the characteristics of a PO?

Answer 14

PO is one person, not a committee. They represent the interests of multiple stakeholders within the company and may represent a committee. Their decisions must be respected and supported by the whole organisation if they’re to be successful. No one can make the dev team work off of a different set of requirements or priorities.

Question 15

What are the characteristics of the dev team?

Answer 15

• Cross functional - they have all competencies to deliver a done increment of product. No dependence on outside help.
• Self organising - they are empowered by the org to manage and organise their own work. No one tells them how to translate a backlog item into an increment of work
• No titles, no sub-teams - no unnecessary tiers or structures.
• Accountability shared by all - each individual may have specialised skill and focus but the team as a whole is accountable for the product increment.

Question 16

What are the characteristics of the Scrum Master?

Answer 16

The Scrum Master is the servant leader for the whole team. They remove impediments and help advocate and communicate with people outside of the Scrum team on what interactions are helpful and which aren’t.

Question 17

What is the key theory behind Scrum?

Answer 17

Scrum framework is based on the empirical process control theory, or empiricism.
Empiricism means knowledges comes from experience and making decisions based on what is known.

Question 18

What is the ideal dev team size and why?

Answer 18

Should be between 3 - 9 members, not including PO/SM, unless they’re also working on dev. Small enough to be agile and large enough to complete significant work.

Less than 3: Skill constraints that may jeopardize producing a potentially releasable increment, decreased interaction, smaller productivity gains.

More than 9: Too much coordination and too much complexity.

Question 19

How can you tell what the PO has decided regarding the product?

Answer 19

This is visible via the Product Backlog, it is the content and the order of the items.

Question 20

How does the Scrum master serve the PO?

Answer 20

Essentially helping PO accomplish his responsibilities and all things related to the backlog:

• Ensuring the product goals and scope is understood across the whole team.
• Finding techniques related to better backlog management.
• Making sure that the team understands why the back log items need to be clear and concise.
• Making sure the PO knows how to prioritise the backlog to maximise value.
• Facilitation Scrum events.

Question 21

How does the Scrum Master serve the Dev team?

Answer 21

Also helping them understand their jobs and help support them:

• coaching on cross-functionality and self organisation.
• Removing impediments
• Facilitate scrum events
• Support and coaching when the overall org hasn’t fully adopted Scrum.

Question 22

How does the Scrum Master serve the Organisation?

Answer 22

Essentially they’re the Scrum advocate within the organisation, advocacy and facilitating adoption:

• Leading/coaching scrum adoption
• Facilitate Scrum implementation
• Helping everyone in org to understand Scrum and empirical product management.

Question 23

What is a Sprint?

Answer 23

A time box of a month or less, during which an increment of “done” work is produced that’s usable and potentially releasable.

Question 24

What are the characteristics of a Sprint?

Answer 24

Each spring can be treated like a project that contains a goal of what’s to be built, a design, a flexible plan to accomplish it and the end creation.

• A new sprint starts immediately after the previously one ends.
• no changes are made during that would endanger sprint goal.
• Scope of work maybe re-negotiated or clarified between PO and dev team as more is learned.

Question 25

What's the structure of a Sprint?

Answer 25

A sprint is consisted of: - Sprint Planning - Daily Scrums - Development work - Sprint Review - Sprint Retrospective

Question 26

Can a sprint be cancelled?

Answer 26

Yes, in cases where the sprint goals is obsolete, but due to the short duration of the sprints, this rarely makes sense and fairly uncommon. - Only the PO can officially cancel a sprint, but POS may do this based on influence from other stakeholders or members of the scrum team.

Question 27

What happens when a sprint is cancelled?

Answer 27

When sprint is cancelled, any done pieces of work is reviewed. If the PO deems it ok, the done pieces can be released. The remaining or incomplete work items are re-estimated and put back into the backlog.

Question 28

What goes into Sprint Planning?

Answer 28

Sprint Planning is a time boxed event that's a maximum of 8 hours for a month-long sprint. It's purpose is to determine: - What can be done in this sprint? - How will the work get done?

Question 29

How does the Scrum team determine WHAT can be done in a sprint during Sprint planning?

Answer 29

PO will discuss the sprint goal and the backlog items that she thinks would reach the sprint goal if completed during this sprint. The dev team will discuss and evaluate their capacity to produce the work and then select the backlog items to work on. Only the dev team can decide for itself the number of backlog items that they can accomplish within the sprint. Input: Backlog items, latest product increment, dev capacity, past dev team performance. Outcome: a sprint goal, and a flexible plan of which backlog items to work on.

Question 30

How does the Scrum team determine HOW will the work get done during Sprint planning?

Answer 30

The dev team will now create a Sprint Backlog, which contains the selected product backlog items that they will work on along with a plan on how to do it. - At the end of the Sprint planning meetings, Dev team will have broken down the work to be done in the first days of the sprint into time units. - PO and dev team will collaborate as needed to re-negotiate scope, clarify requirements, etc. - Dev team may also consult other tech or domain experts as needed.

Question 31

What are some characteristics of a Sprint Goal

Answer 31

- Output of Sprint Planning - Some flexibility - Does allow some flexibility for dev team on the functionality created during the sprint. - Coherence - It's the coherence "glue" that holds all of the sprint backlog items and makes sure the dev team works together in a joint initiative, instead of separate ones.

Question 32

What are characteristics of the Daily Scrum?

Answer 32

- 15 minute time-boxed event - Same time, same place each day. - Inspect/Adapt Event - Not status focused, impediment review, what was done and what needs to be done to meet sprint goal? - Responsibility of the dev team - other people can join but cannot disrupt. Scrum master do not need to attend, just need to make sure it occurs.

Question 33

What are the characteristics of a Sprint Review?

Answer 33

- 4 hour meeting for month long sprints at most. - Inspect/Adapt Event - the completed increment is presented, inspected and product backlog will be adapted as needed. - Participants: Scrum Team and stakeholders. - Collaborate on what was done and what should be done next to optimise value.

Question 34

Tell me more about happens at a Sprint Review.

Answer 34

- Participants: Scrum Team and stakeholders invited by PO - PO explains which product backlog items were done and not done. - Dev team explains what went well, what problems they ran into and how those were solved. - Dev team then demonstrates the finished work and answers questions. - PO discusses the backlog as it stands and any relevant delivery dates. - Everyone discusses what to do next: timeline, budget, potential capabilities, marketplace changes, and what's the most valuable thing to do next. - Output: updated product backlog, possible items for the next Sprint Planning sessions.

Question 35

What are some characteristics of a Sprint Retrospective?

Answer 35

- 3 hour meeting for month-long springs at most. - An opportunity for the Scrum Team to review itself: How did the last sprint go in terms of people, relationships, process and tools? - Identify major items that went well and potential improvements. - Create a plan to IMPLEMENT those improvements to how the team works together.

Question 36

Tell me more about the point of a Sprint Retrospective?

Answer 36

- Formal opportunity to implement improvements - improvements may be and should be implemented at any time, but the Sprint Retro makes it part of the process. - By end of the Retro, the team should have a really clear idea of what needs to be improved and has plan to put it into action by the next Sprint. - It's an opportunity for the Scrum Team to practice continuous improvement on its own processes, tools and ways of working.

Question 37

What are the three artifacts of Scrum methodology?

Answer 37

- Product Backlog - Sprint Backlog - Increment of Work

Question 38

What does a Scrum artifact mean and what is it designed to do?

Answer 38

Definition - things that represent key information related to the work to be done, so everyone involved has common understanding of the work. - Promotes transparency and opportunities for inspection/adaptation.

Question 39

What are the characteristics of a Product Backlog?

Answer 39

- Single source of requirements for the product: all functions, features, improvements and fixes destined for future release. - PO is responsible for its content, ordering, availability. - "Living Artifact" - Dynamic, evolving and never complete: if a product exists, its backlog exists, constantly adapted and changed depending on its environment and the product.

Question 40

What attributes does a particular Product Backlog item have?

Answer 40

- Description of what it is. - Order - Estimate of effort involved - Value - Tests that prove it is complete when done.

Question 41

What is Product Backlog Refinement?

Answer 41

Process of adding more details, estimates and order to the backlog items. - This is an ongoing process done in collaboration with PO and the dev team. PO can do this at their own discretion at any time. - Scrum Team has sole discretion on how and when this refinement is done. - Limited to 10% of the dev team capacity. You want them to be working on building, not too much time refining backlog items.

Question 42

What are some characteristics of the Product Backlog

Answer 42

- Higher ordered items has more detail than lower ordered items: more precise estimates. - items that are destined for the upcoming sprints should be so clearly refined that their details show the work can be done within that sprint's time frame. These are considered "ready" for selection into Sprint Planning. - used to monitor progress towards product goals: remaining work can be added together to get a clear picture and project progress.

Question 43

Who determines estimates for Product Backlog Items?

Answer 43

The dev team: the people doing the work are solely responsible for providing the estimates of what's needed. PO can influence and make trade offs with dev team, but ultimately dev team makes the call.

Question 44

What are some characteristics of a Sprint Backlog?

Answer 44

Sprint Backlog = set of selected product backlog items + a plan to deliver it to meet the sprint goal. - Highly visible real-time: Provides visible all the work the dev team has identified as necessary to meet sprint goal. - Continuous Improvement: Must include at least ONE high priority process improvements that came out of the last Sprint Retrospective meeting! - Emerges AS the team works through the plan - Dynamic: will be updated and adjusted as the work is being done. - Belongs solely to the dev team. - used to monitor Sprint Progress - remaining work can be added together to project whether the team's on track.

Question 45

What are some characteristics of a Product Increment?

Answer 45

- sum of all completed product backlog items + the VALUE of all previously completed increments of the product! - Must be "done" by end of the sprint: usable and meet's the team's definition of Done. - May or may not be released: PO's prerogative, but must be usable and releasable.

Question 46

Why is it important that the Scrum artifacts embody transparency as completely as possible?

Answer 46

- Since all decisions about maximising value and control risk are all based on the Scrum artifacts, any incompletely transparency seriously compromises these decisions and the efficacy of them.

Question 47

Tell me more about definition of "Done" and its characteristics within a dev organisation.

Answer 47

- Shared understanding: everyone on the Scrum team MUST know what it means and be on the same page. - Any product/system should have a DoD that's a standard for any work done on it. - If DoD is part of the standards/guidelines of the company: all Scrum teams MUST follow it as a minimum. - If not part of the standards, all Scrum teams MUST mutually define what it is! - Additive: DoD also needs to consider that the current increment must also work with all previous increments produced. - Become more stringent as scrum team matures - DoD also may evolve to include new conditions, which may also uncover work to be done in previously considered "done" increments.