Scrum in a Nutshell
(transcript of the Scrum-in-a-Nutshell-video)
This is an introductory video by Anja Stiedl.
This video is based on the scrum guide published in November 2020.
What is Scrum?
Scrum is a team based approach for creative, organic work where the outcome or the path of development is unknown or ambiguous.
Scrum emphasizes on teamwork and collaboration, customer centricity, continuous improvement, and the incremental and iterative development of a product in short cycles, called Sprints.
In Scrum, a self-managed and cross-functional team works together and turns ideas into valuable, useful product Increments within a Sprint.
In numbers, Scrum consists of 3 5 3 elements and the rules how the work together:
- 3 Accountabilities fulfilled by the people working in the Scrum Team.
- 5 Events give rhythm, structure, and clarity to the collaboration.
- 3 Artifacts drive the value and outcome oriented work.
People and Teams!
Scrum defines 5 values that help people in Scrum Teams in their effort to create on open and honest place where collaboration can truly flourish and everybody can grow: commitment, focus, openness, respect, and courage.
Up to 10 people are in one Scrum Team.
In the Scrum Team, there are no hierarchies and no sub-teams. People on the scrum team fulfill the following accountabilities: Product Owner, Developers and Scrum Master.
The Product Owner focuses on the question “why and what are we working on?”
The Developers are driven by the question “how are we doing it?”
And the scrum master is looking for answers to the question “how can we improve?”
They work together as a self-managed, cross-functional team and are together responsible for all product related activities.
5 Scrum Events plus 1 Activity!
The Sprint is the heartbeat of Scrum.
With a constant length of up to one month it gives cadence and structure. All other events happen within the Sprint. there is no gap in between them: sprints happen one after the other.
The Sprint starts with the Sprint Planning where the Scrum Team creates a Sprint Backlog which consists of a Sprint Goal, selected Product backlog Items for the Sprint, and an actionable plan to deliver Increments.
Every day the developers meet to adjust their Sprint Plan toward their Sprint Goal. This Daily Scrum is a short event of maximum 15 minutes.
The Sprint ends with 2 more Events: Sprint Review and Retrospective. In the Review the Scrum Team and stakeholders are elaborating and collecting ideas for product improvement.
In the Retro the Scrum Team reflects on their collaboration and finds ideas to adjust and improve. The refinement is an ongoing activity on strategical level to prepare the Product Backlog for upcoming sprints.
3 Artifacts and their 3 Commitments
The „things“ that every Scrum Team works with are called the Scrum Artifacts. They are Product Backlog, Product Goal, and the Increments. Each of the Artifacts has a commitment that helps the people in the Scrum Team in their focus and clarity.
The Product Backlog is a list of all the ideas how to improve the product in the future. It is an emergent and ordered list of Product Backlog items. It is the single source of work undertaken by the Scrum Team.
The Product Goal is the unique objective that a Scrum Team pursues at a time. It helps to fill and order the Product Backlog.
The Sprint Backlog is a plan by and for the Developers what to accomplish during the Sprint. It is addresses the questions WHY, What and HOW are we working during this sprint?
The Sprint Goal defines the focus of the sprint and helps to select Product Backlog Items to achieve this goal.
The Increment is a concrete step toward the Product Goal. It consists of all the prior increments plus some additional functionality. An Increment always needs to meet the Definition-of-Done.
The Definition-of-Done defines what the Scrum Team means when they say „we are done“. Thus it clarifies the work to be done that an Increment emerges from each Product Backlog Item. The Definition-of-Done defines the level of quality for the Product.
