Scrum & Agile

The Basics

About Me

• New to development (like all of you)

• Certified Scrum Master

• Majored in Operations Research

• Have worked on many project teams

What is Agile?

What is Agile?

Agile is an incremental approach to software development, focusing on releasing deliverables early in the project and improving them iteratively

What is the alternative?

Waterfall Methodology

Waterfall development is the opposite of Agile Development. ALL planning in the waterfall methodology happens before any code is written, which can take months or years.

Why would we choose Agile?

Key Comparisons

Agile vs Waterfal

Scrum

What is Scrum?

Simply put, Scrum is a teamwork framework - it includes tools, roles, and specific meetings that all used together, help a team complete its work.

But what about the scary words at the start of the slides? 

It doesn't sound so 'simple'

There is some specialized vocabulary associated with scrum, but once you learn the words it won’t seem as scary (hopefully)

Sprint

• The Sprint is at the core of Scrum
• 1-3 week period of time during which work gets done
• Sprints follow each other immediately
• No changes that would affect current Sprint Goal can be made during a sprint

The Scrum Team

Teams are small, self-managing, cross-functional units with no internal hierarchy

Teams must be large enough to cover all needs, but small enough to remain nimble

(usually caps at ~10 people)

Each team has:

• 1 Product Owner
• 1 Scrum Master
• Developers

Product Owner

• Maximizes the value of the product created by the Scrum team
• Responsible for maintaining, changing, & prioritizing the product backlog
• Decides when to release done work to users

Developers

• Responsible for creating every incremental piece of the product
• Create the sprint backlog (aka plan) for the sprint
• Adapt plan daily to achieve Sprint Goal

Scrum Master

• A servant leader within the team who removes obstacles for developers
• Responsible for keeping team 'Scrum' and their effectiveness
• There to facilitate and coach

Scrum Events

The Sprint Contains All

Sprint Planning

Daily Scrum

Sprint Review

Sprint Retrospective

Each event serves the purposes of providing transparency and offering opportunities to inspect and edit Scrum Artifacts

Scrum Artifacts

Scrum Artifacts

Product Backlog => Product Goal

Sprint Backlog => Sprint Goal

Increment => Definition of Done

Each artifact contains a clear, definable commitment. They help measure progress.

Sprint Events (revisited)

Each event is time-boxed to avoid stalling and loss of momentum

Daily Scrum

• 15-minute daily event for the Developers
• Held same time, same place daily
• Good daily scrums increase transparency, remove obstacles, and eliminate need for endless meetings
• Not a time to sit around and talk - it is a focused discussion of where team is in terms of reaching Sprint Goal
• Result is an actionable plan of work for the next 24 hours

Sprint Planning

• 8-hour time boxed event for a 1-month sprint
• Product Owner ensures team knows why this sprint is valuable
• Scrum team defines a Sprint Goal
• Developers determine which high priority items from Product Backlog can be completed during sprint, adding them to Sprint Backlog

Sprint Review

• 4-hour timeboxed event for a 1-month sprint
• Scrum team presents results from sprint to stakeholders
• Product Backlog can be adjusted at this meeting

Sprint Retrospective

• 3-hour timeboxed event for a 1-month Sprint
• The Scrum team looks back on the sprint and its successes, failures, processes, etc.
• Team identifies changes to be made to improve the process
• Event concludes current sprint

Key Takeaway

Agile and Scrum are focused on continuous, evolving development and release

It's not all Sunshine & Rainbows

Real life isn't Perfect

• Companies can abuse the system to drive teams to exhaustion
• Teams can form hierarchies and defeat the whole point of Scrum
• Meetings... beware of too many meetings

Thank you!