16 Feb 2025
Upcoming Trainings
| Date | Workshops | Trainer | Location | Register | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Online Learning (self paced) |  | Scrum Foundations (40 Minutes) | Hiren Doshi | Udemy | Free |
| Mar 22-23 (9am-5pm) |  | Advanced Professional Scrum Master (PSM II) workshop | Punit Doshi | Virtual Class | Register |
04 Dec 2020
Scrum Guide 2020 updates (compared to 2017)
2020 Scrum Guide is out and we thought of sharing some insights with you so you are aware of the changes. Scrum and it’s essence is the same and that means the core elements of the framework are still relevant. Here are a few things for you to remember –
Highlights of changes –
- Less prescriptive
- Introduction of Product Goal
- One Team (no sub-teams) and One Product focus
- Simplification of language (IT references removed) for wider audience
Prescriptions Removed –
Few prescriptions are removed. It doesn’t mean that those details are not relevant anymore. If your teams find these valuable, continuing with them is a good idea. However, if you want to experiment with different alternatives, give it a try.
Events:
- Optional “three questions” for Daily Scrum removed
- Sprint Retrospective commitments are no longer required in Sprint Backlog
- Typical 10% capacity needed for Product Backlog Refinement (not a formal event) removed
- Prescriptive elements about the events are condensed or removed (activities mentioned in 2017 guide are still valid, but teams can take up alternative approaches toward achieving the purpose)
- Optional meeting after Daily Scrum for in-depth discussion
Artifacts:
- Attributes of Product Backlog Items (Description, Order and Size) are optional
- Monitoring progress towards the goals section
- Product Owner decides when to release Increment
Product Goal –
It describes a future state of the product which can serve as a target for the Scrum Team to plan against. The long-term objective for the Scrum Team. They must fulfill (or abandon) one objective before taking on the next. Read more.
Artifacts Commitment –
Each artifact contains a commitment to ensure it provides information that enhances transparency and focus against which progress can be measured. These commitments exist to reinforce empiricism. Read more.
| Artifact | Commitment | |
| Product Backlog | Product Goal | |
| Sprint Backlog | Sprint Goal | |
| Increment | Definition of Done |
Updates –
Development Team to Developers: There is no separate (Development) Team within the Scrum Team, thereby promoting ONE Scrum Team focused on the same objective.
From Roles to Accountabilities: This change has been introduced to stress on the accountabilities and not job titles. Scrum Team consists of three different sets of accountabilities – Product Owner, Developers and Scrum Master.
From Self-organize to Self-manage: “Scrum Team is self-managing, meaning they internally decide who does what, when, and how.” This change in term is a way of calling out that more empowered your Scrum Team is, the better their chances of success. Read more.
Introducing “Why” in Sprint Planning: Along with “What and “How”, Scrum Team discuss “Why is this Sprint valuable?” This provides the answer to decide the Sprint Goal. In essence, we would recommend starting your Sprint Planning with Why. Read more.
Other changes –
- Suggested Scrum Team size of 10 or fewer people
- Multiple increments can be created within a Sprint
- Along with Empiricism, addition of “Lean Thinking” as a foundation of Scrum framework
- Replacement of term “estimate” with “size”
- The entire Scrum Team is accountable for creating a valuable, useful Increment every Sprint
19 May 2020
“Patience” is the sixth Scrum value.
*Covid is a fictional character based on my imagination that represents the strain of CoronaVirus that is causing the disease Covid-19. This article discusses Business Agility and why some organizations are not able to reap the benefits Scrum has to offer. (more…)
15 May 2020
Only Trust can save millions of lives.
*Covid is a fictional character based on my imagination that represents the strain of CoronaVirus that is causing the disease Covid-19. This article discusses how Trust can bring transparency an absolutely essential ingredient for empiricism. (more…)
04 May 2020
Hiren’s secret conversation with Covid
*Covid is a fictional character based on my imagination that represents the strain of CoronaVirus that is causing the disease Covid-19. This article discusses the Scrum framework and empiricism.
Covid-19: Knock! Knock!
Hiren: Who’s there?
Covid-19: Covid.
Hiren: Covid who?
Covid-19: It’s me, the Corona Virus of 2019. These Homo sapiens have nicknamed me as Covid-19. I like it. Hiren, you can call me Covid. How are you?
Hiren: Oh boy…COVID!! Err… I am doing well, but what do you want from me? Are you here to get me?
Covid-19: Oh no. I am just here for general chitchat with you. Tell me, how’s your Scrum training business?
Hiren: Are you kidding me about the business? You have single-handedly paused the entire world. Every person on this planet is scared of you. Why don’t you just disappear?
Covid-19: How rude. Why should I disappear? I love this beautiful planet too. It is equally mine, and I have been in existence here for a long time too. Let’s co-exist.
Hiren: Co-exist with you? Nonsense. I don’t want to argue with you. Tell me how may I help you?
Covid-19: I have heard the scientist communities from these Homo sapiens are using some framework called Scrum to eradicate me. Haha… Is this true? Please educate me. How?
Hiren: Correct. Well, we humans are the most intelligent race on this planet Covid. Over the years you must have heard from your friends Polio, AIDS, Ebola, Nipah, Influenza, and others how we handled them and we will handle you too.
Covid-19: But right now I am handling the entire Homo sapiens race. Haha. What do you know about me?
Hiren: Using the Scrum Framework, we have been continuously experimenting. Everyday iteratively and incrementally we are learning more about you. And with regular inspection and adaptation and through empirical scientific evidence we have identified many facts about you Covid.
Covid-19: Like?
Hiren: We know your Genome sequence. We know what you are made of now. We conduct Daily Scrums to put a solid plan for 24 hours and check the progress towards our goal, Sprint Review to get feedback from the key stakeholders and Sprint Retrospective to improve ourselves. We have about 80 fast paced heavily funded projects going around the globe and we will find a vaccination to destroy you soon.
Covid-19: Why is your race always angry and looking to destroy everything that comes their way? Have some respect and compassion for other organisms too.
Hiren: Why should I have respect for you? Because of you, we have lost many precious lives. And only because of you the world’s economy is in shambles.
Covid-19: Honestly, I have more reasons to get angry with you. Your race is very greedy and in that greed, you all have destroyed this beautiful planet. As a virus, I only have the ‘need’ to find a host to survive. But in your race, even after you meet your basic ‘needs’ you have unlimited ‘wants’ and these never end. Everyone always wants more… So I am equally angry with you. But I have respect for you Homo sapiens.
Hiren: You are joking right?
Covid-19: Not really. Let me prove it to you. Your innovative race came up with a new concept called “Social Distancing”, correct?
Hiren: Yes. What about it?
Covid-19: Our race self-organized and we have agreed to not bother Homo sapiens who practice “Social Distancing” sincerely. In fact, we have extended our respect to stay away from anyone who is going to wear a mask and follow the hygiene guidelines from W.H.O. Makes sense?
Hiren: Wow Self-organized. Huh? I am glad to hear this and I will pass this message around. So are you suggesting that we both can co-exist in this ecosystem and over time we will get used to each other and maybe even complement each other?
Covid-19: Yes, of course. And Hiren…
Hiren: What?
Covid-19: Show humility.
Hiren: I will work on it Covid. In the meantime, please stop bothering and hurting my people.
Covid-19: Sure Hiren. Stay healthy and I will come to meet you soon to learn a bit more about Scrum. Bye.
Hiren: Meet me for chitchat only 🙂
24 Apr 2019
Scrum is driving us crazy!
Quite a few teams in organizations implementing Scrum depict their frustration in statements like “Scrum is driving us crazy!”, “It’s too chaotic!”, “As if we didn’t have enough meetings, now we have to deal with a ton more!”, “So many metrics we need to improve upon?!?”. With the discussion that follows, it becomes fairly apparent that problem lies elsewhere.
After discussing with people, it turns out that their frustrations are primarily surrounding complimentary practices which are not part of Scrum. Few examples –
- User Stories
- Velocity
- Planning Poker
- Story Pointing
- Burndown charts
- JIRA tool
- Information Radiators
These practices are meant to be leveraged when they help the team; if they aren’t helping, gladly skip them to avoid carrying unnecessary baggage. By avoiding these (if needed), you will be able to relieve the teams from most of the issues. Some of the problems I have witnessed – Maintaining separate virtual Sprint Backlog in JIRA as well as physical board [a classic Lean waste]; write every requirement and feature in User Story format [people are forced to do this and abuse the format]; forcing teams to increase their velocity sprint-over-sprint [read more on this here]; Burndown charts have to look smooth so we know that we are delivering value continuously [not true and unfair to the delivery teams].
Now let’s talk about what Scrum is about. For delivery teams and management, core of Scrum lies in these aspects –
- Moving away from long-term plans and working towards common, yet shared goals
- Delivering products iteratively through short, high value Sprints
- Be empirical in your approach by regularly inspecting artefacts, processes, tools, etc. and adapt based on evidence in your hands
- Engaging stakeholders often to gather valuable feedback about the product to assist in tactical change in direction, if needed
- Shifting from project mindset to product mindset
- Focus on delivering value to your customers rather than ‘keeping people busy’
- Help improve productivity of the team by removing impediments that stall them from meeting their goals
- Give control to the delivery team rather than managing or ‘micro-managing’ their tasks
- Building trust by living the 5 values of Scrum
- Looking for every opportunity to improve upon yourselves as a team and as individuals
Remember Scrum does not solve your problems, it just surfaces the dysfunctions that exist in your ecosystem and sometimes it can be overwhelming. So it will mean you need to unlearn some of the old habits (most of them die hard!) and will surely drive you crazy till you start reaping the benefits of Scrum.