Although Scrum has an acknowledged body of knowledge, the Scrum Guide, it is -by design- incomplete. Scrum is a framework, not a methodology. With Scrum, an empirical foundation is created from which the details and specifics of the actual working processes emerge. And while the actual working processes keep evolving, the foundation of Scrum provides stability.
Scrum needs the continuous selection, application and revision of good practices, strategies and tactics to be really effective. The rules in themselves provide foundational guidance. The effective benefits an organization gets from Scrum largely depend on how the game is played. Ultimately the benefits gained from Scrum will vary with the implementation, usage and application of Scrum; from roles, rules, players, and principles to techniques, practices, strategies and tactics.
Doing Scrum, and doing it properly, is only the beginning. Yes, you do Scrum if you have the formal elements in place. And from that much more beauty comes within reach. We refer to this idea as ScrumAnd.
There is a ScrumAnd for a myriad of elements included in or attached to the use of the Scrum framework. I will illustrate the ScrumAnd potential to augment the fun, energy, and benefits from Scrum upon 3 elements only:
1. The Product Owner role
Yes, you do Scrum if you have a Product Owner. And you will do even better depending on how the role is fulfilled:
Scrum is at first often implemented as the new IT-process, or is started within the IT-departments exclusively. So, a business analyst is put in the role. In organizations suffering from the traditional Business-IT dichotomy, it is often much later that business comes into play; forcing themselves in or being invited to do so.
- A (business) Analyst in the role has limited benefits. But development organizations feel like securing control over the process with an analyst as Product Owner; just because it is an IT-person (‘Can’t trust business people!’). However, for many decisions the analyst doesn’t have the answer, needs to revert to product management, look at the project manager, wait for an external decision, get an upfront approval from a steering committee. Every time the Development Team is halted, must wait, pick up other work, restart previous work, park work for a longer time. No flow, no value.
- A proxy for the business, like an account manager or other gap bridging alternatives, is slightly better. Control remains with IT (‘Still can’t trust business people!’) but IT puts a person in the role who is closer to the business, who is more connected to the business. It creates less delays, less waiting time, less hick-ups; although many of those remain.
- Often the business gets a smell of the role and sees the fun and advantage of it, or the organization just opens up to broader collaboration. A person is sent in from a business or product management department to fulfill the role. It is another improvement. There is more direct availability of functional knowledge and stakeholder expectations. Yet, still much waiting time for decisions by the real authorities, as the business representative often has limited autonomy in his representation of product management aspects to the development organization.
- It works better if the person is not only from business, but also has the trust and the mandate to take decisions (on the spot). A mandate is a signal that the role is taken more seriously. Often the person in the role is allowed to spend more time on it. Less hick-ups, less context and task switching, largely improved flow. The Development Team can focus more, and get things done.
- It is great if the Product Owner is a mini-CEO over the product, a real owner of the product (what’s in a role’s name, right?), a business person with full (functional and budgetary) responsibility over the product and knowledge over all product management aspects (marketing, competition, users, legal, finance). The person’s professional life is dedicated to the well-being of the product. They don’t come much better than this.
2. Releasable software
Yes, you do Scrum if you have a definition of Done. And you will do even better when it reflects ‘releasable’ and all work for it can be done within a Sprint (not post-Sprint):
- Development (here as synonymous to ‘programming’) is quite essential in the wonderful world of software development. Without it, no result, right? And although the importance of it is often even underrated (think of the separation of design from development in separate, upfront phases), programming in itself is hardly enough. Although code aspects like clear code, self-explanatory code, naming conventions, refactoring are very important, it is only the start. But for sure, without development (‘coding’), no progress as there can’t be any working software, the primary measure of progress.
- Code requires testing. And if all testing is to be done within a Sprint, testing skills are required in the Development Team and testing becomes part of the development activities. Testing is minimally needed at a technical unit and at a functional level. It gets even better if this part of development can be done first, can be automated as much as possible and is performed progressively within the Sprint, not just toward the end of the Sprint.
- The releasability of an Increment, produced by the end of a Sprint, takes a giant leap if all integration, regression testing and alike work is done within the Sprint, and within the Sprint across multiple teams working on the same product or dependent products. It does help additionally if also this work can be automated and is done progressively in the Sprint, not just toward the end of the Sprint.
- Teams can do better if they not only have the skills, access and mandate to perform QA work in the Sprint, but are also facilitated by organizational guidelines for quality, designs and architecture. No rework arising from QA on earlier Increments disrupts a current Sprint, or must be added to the Product Backlog. It does help additionally if any QA work can be automated and is done progressively in the Sprint, if quality is built in into the product and not just verified toward the end of the Sprint.
- Even when doing Scrum, many organizations foresee additional stabilization time to prepare an Increment or a set of Increments for an actual release. Imagine the gain if this work can be done within the Sprint. Every 2-3 weeks a truly potentially shippable Increment of software is available, that can be brought to the market without additional costs or work. A good time to start thinking about continuous delivery.
3. A Collaborative Team
Yes, you do Scrum if you have a Scrum Team with a Development Team, a Product Owner, and a Scrum Master. And you will do even better when the team can improve its relationships and collaboration, often by remaining stable:
Self-organized team work is the corner stone of Scrum. Teams however cannot be built or constructed like a mechanical object. With support, cherishing and nurturing, a collaborative team might gradually emerge.
- A team gets formed by bringing a group of people together, preferably -but not always- in a shared workspace. Most of them are in observing mode, are keeping some distance. Formal arrangements and agreements get made, possibly including team agreements, engineering standards, a definition of Done, team values, meeting timings. And the team formally starts following them. Gradually people start expressing deeper thoughts, ideas and concerns.
- A team goes through some storming as the team members get to know each other better and start expressing options and ideas that don’t match exactly. They sort the differences out. At first they might take it personally only to find out later that they are not used to the others’ gestures, tone of voice and facial expressions. They find out and they build a sense of trust.
- The group of people jells better and better. The whole becomes equal to the sum of the parts. They become co-operative, they better align their individual work with the work of the others. They adjust their individual expectations to their team peers. They find a productive way to deal with conflicting ideas.
- The team is really starting to know each other, even share more personal backgrounds. They have grown confidence in understanding each others’ remarks, stop taking comments personally. They stop looking for blame and stop covering up. A solution becomes the goal. As there is trust, and openness and honesty arising from it, they develop shared goals and are committed to these shared goals and objectives. Individual benefits are being sacrificed for the good of the whole.
- The team has become a smooth, collaborative unit. Everyone’s focus is on the whole. The team members have passionate debates, engage on opposing ideas, look for the best possible outcomes and get their satisfaction from being part of the group. What used to take them hours and hours to sort out now only takes them a smile and a wink.
Organizations tend to overlook the scaling potential in the way Scrum is being played. Take advantage of these options first, enjoy the cumulative effect of multiple ScrumAnds and avoid the additional complexity that arises from volume-oriented scaling like adding people, adding teams, adding roles, adding phases.
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[…] Complementary Practice: Ideally, the Product Owner has Profit and Loss accountability for the product since they are the product value maximizer. Obviously, they should also have the associated empowerment that goes along with the P&L responsibility. For more good info on how best to fulfill the Product Owner role, see the first section here. […]
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The ideas here is extension of official Scrum Guide. The idea of collaborative team in stage is a popular management topic. The product owner role is a variation of administrative-coordinator-driver-leader paradigm, except product owner is not manager of the team.So the focus is to bring sense of fulfillment, leadership and the buy-in within the product. And the releasable software is a condensation of many topics especially when the team tries to bring integration and QA *within* a sprint. Some did not get past formal testing (the put that outside the current sprint).