Learning from Scrum Guide 2020

Preparing for Professional Scrum Master and Professional Scrum Product Owner Certification has helped me revise and strengthen my concepts about Scrum and Agile Software Development in general.

Below is the summary of what I have learned from Scrum Guide 2020

What is Scrum?

Scrum is a framework for creating complex products in complex environments. It is a light weight framework that to generate value through adaptive solutions for complex problems. Scrum does not eliminate complexity instead it offers a framework to the Scrum Team to deal with that complexity.

3 Roles

• Product Owner: The Product Owner is accountable for maximising the value of the product and the work of the Scrum Team. For Product Owners to succeed, the entire organization must respect their decisions.
• Scrum Master: The Scrum Master is the leader who serve the Scrum Team and the organization. He is accountable for the effectiveness of the Scrum Team.
• Developers: The Developers are a group of professionals in the Scrum Team that are committed to create a usable and valuable Increment that is delivered at the end of the Sprint. As a team, Developers have all of the skills necessary to create a product Increment.

Scrum Team: the scrum team comprises of the product owner, the scrum master and the developers.

3 Artifact

• Product Backlog: The Product Backlog is an emergent, ordered list of what is needed to improve the product. It is the single source of work undertaken by the Scrum Team. If there are multiple teams working on the same product then they all share the same product backlog. The Product Backlog is dynamic; it constantly changes to identify what the product needs in order to be appropriate, competitive, and useful. 
• Sprint Backlog: The Sprint Backlog makes visible all of the items that the Developers have selected from the product backlog to meet the Sprint Goal. The Developers modify the Sprint Backlog throughout the Sprint, and the Sprint Backlog emerges during the Sprint. The Developers may work with the Product Owner to remove or add items if it finds it has more or less capacity than it expected.
• Increment: An increment is a concrete stepping stone towards the Product Goal. Each increment is a combination of all the previous increments and is potentially shippable to production. By releasing the increment to customers the Scrum Team can validate the assumptions they have made about the value of the product.

3 Commitments

• Product Goal:  A product is a vehicle to deliver value. It has a clear boundary, known stakeholders, well-defined users or customers. A product could be a service, a tangible product or something abstract. A product goal describes the future state of the product and it servers as the target for the scrum team to help them with planning.
• Sprint Goal: The Sprint Goal is the commitment by the developers for the Sprint that they are working on. It helps them to focus on the delivering the Increment.
• Definition of Done: The Definition of Done is a commitment towards the Increment. The Increment reviewed at the Sprint Review must meet the Definition of Done. The Definition of Done is used to assess when work is complete on the product Increment. If the Definition of Done for an Increment is part of the standards of the organization, all Scrum Teams must follow it as a minimum. If it is not an organisational standard, the Scrum Team must create a Definition of Done appropriate for the product.

5 events

• Sprint Planning: Sprint Planning initiates the Sprint by laying out the work to be performed for the Sprint. This resulting plan is created by the collaborative work of the entire Scrum Team. The Product Owner ensures that attendees are prepared to discuss the most important Product Backlog items and how they map to the Product Goal.
• Daily Scrum: The daily scrum is time-boxed for 15 minutes. It is held at the same time and place in order to reduce complexity. Scrum does not prescribe to ask the 3 questions (what I was working on yesterday, what I will be working on today and if there are any impediments that I am facing) but the team may use them if they feel the need to.
• Sprint Review: During sprint review the Scrum Team and stakeholders inspect the outcome of a Sprint and figure out what to do next.
• Sprint Retrospective: The Sprint Retrospective is an opportunity for the Scrum Team to inspect itself and create a plan for improvements to be enacted during the next Sprint. It is mandatory for the product owner to be present at the Sprint Retrospective.
• The Sprint: the sprint is the container for all the above events

The Sprint

• The heart of the scrum is the Sprint.
• The Sprint normally has a timebox of one month or less during which an increment of the working product is delivered.
• Thus the purpose of the Sprint is to produce is to produce a valuable and useful increment of the working product.
• The Sprint is over when the timebox expires.
• The next sprint begins immediate after the conclusion of the previous sprint.
• A Sprint is cancelled only if the Sprint Goal becomes obsolete.
• Only the product owner has the authority to cancel the Sprint.

Responsibility of the Product Owner

• The Product Owner is accountable for effective Product Backlog management as well as communicating the Product Goal.
• The Product Owner is the sole person responsible for ordering the Product Backlog.
• The Product Owner has to ensure that the product backlog is transparent, visible and understood by clearly communicating the product backlog items (PBIs).
• The Product Owner is responsible for actively and regularly engaging the stakeholders in order to be able to represent the stakeholders and their needs. 

Responsibility of the Scrum Master

• The Scrum Master ensures that all Scrum events take place and are positive, productive, and kept within the timebox.
• The Scrum Master serves the Scrum Team by removing impediments that hinder the development of the product and by facilitating Developer decision-making.
• The Scrum Master teaches the Developers to keep the Daily Scrum within the 15-minute timebox. 
• The Scrum Master coaches the team in self-management and working in a cross-functional manner. They help the team focus on creating high-value increments that meets the definition of done.
• The Scrum Master is also responsible for leading, training and coaching the organization in its scrum adoption.

Responsibility of the Developers

• The Developers are required to attend the daily scrum.
• The Developers use the Daily Scrum to inspect progress toward the Sprint Goal.
• The Developers are responsible for managing the progress of work during the Sprint.
• The Developers inspect how progress is trending toward completing the work in the Sprint Backlog.
• The Developers should have all the skills needed to turn the Product Backlog items they select for the Sprint into a useful and valuable increment of the product.

Responsibility of the Scrum Team

• The Scrum Team is responsible for delivering the product iteratively and incrementally to the customers/users and capture their feedback. This helps them in measuring the value of the product and validating their assumptions about the value of the product. If a product is not released, the opportunity to capture user and market feedback is lost.

Technical Debt

• The technical debt is the the obligation an organization incurs when it chooses a product design or construction approach that is expedient in the short term but increases complexity and is more costly in the long-term.

Steps in Sprint Planning

• The Product Owner adjusts the priorities
• The Scrum Master determines the target capacity
• The Product Owner helps in identifying the Sprint Goal along with the Scrum Team
• The Scrum Team then selects, discuss and clarify user stories
• The Developers splits the user stories into individual tasks
• The Developers help in estimating the effort for the individual tasks

Link to Scrum Guide