Work in progress

Ever found yourself overwhelmed, with your sprint board looking more like a Christmas Tree than an organized workspace? ?? I've been there! Let's paint a picture. ??

Imagine a regular product team: 2 frontend developers, 2 backend developers, a designer, and a product manager. They're planning a sprint with a critical task. One of the frontend devs, let’s call him Ben, takes on the sprint goal task. It's a big one, but the team feels it can be finished within the sprint. Ann, the other frontend champ, decides to take on a secondary task, vital but not the sprint's main goal. She doesn’t want to get in Ben's way, thinking, “Hey, let’s multitask! Two tasks in parallel is efficient, right?”

Quiz Time! ?? How do you think, how many chances does Ben have to complete his task successfully within the sprint?

It’s a coin toss: 50-50. Our pal Ben's capacity isn't endless. And if anything goes wrong? Well, sprint disaster alert ??! Worst case: both Ben and Ann, who had a tough week herself, end the sprint with unfinished tasks. That's a stressed team, two pending tasks for the next sprint, and a not-so-happy business potentially rethinking their priorities. Next sprint if you try to finish old tasks and get new ones done - you can end up with almost every task undone and so on. This is called the "snowball effect." ???

But what if there's a plot twist? ??

Let me introduce you to a pill, a little bit painful but efficient: WIP (Work In Progress) limits. It's not just about doing things; it's about doing the right things focused. We limit the number of tasks that can be in progress on the board. For example to 1 or 2. Want to add more? Help others finish theirs.

Let's reimagine. Ben and Ann, instead of going solo, break the big task into small chunks. They can separate if they want but they're still helping to achieve the main goal. After some time, it will be too tight to parallel. When they can, they pair-program, combining forces for dealing with the last challenges. ????

The bonus? Reviews are reeeeally quick! With both in sync on the task, reviews are more constructive, faster, and downright enjoyable. Two heads (with aligned context) are better than one, right?

And trust me, for business the effect is much more important than the efficiency of 1 or 2 people in the sprint. WIP gives the effect ??

My team encountered this problem two years ago. Sprint after sprint, we had some tasks left undone, creating a large snowball effect that was very difficult to manage. So, we asked our Scrum Master for help. After three months of WIP 1, we transformed into a brand new team, meeting every sprint goal on time ?? We removed strict restrictions, but our team has since prioritized completing the sprint goal first, before moving on to parallel tasks.

So, what do you think? Are ready to try WIP or do you already have some experience with it?