193
votes
Accepted
How do I deal with a counterproductive scrum team?
You may have heard a lot of statistics about failed software projects and came to the conclusion that the failure is not of a technical nature. Technological problems can be solved via hundreds of ...
- 14.3k
187
votes
How do I prevent Scrum from turning great developers into average developers?
Don't let Scrum become the process which overwhelms everything else
My friends and I, who are part of Scrum teams are not fans of it. The reason is that in being the one process which has a dedicated ...
- 1,757
182
votes
Should a (junior) developer try to push for better processes and practices in their development/IT team?
Good answers so far, but they don't cover all the bases.
In my experience, many people fresh out of college have fantastic theoretical knowledge - far better than me or many other seniors with ...
- 9,725
152
votes
Team constantly fails to meet sprint goals
You should first ask, 'who cares'?
Completing sprints feels good, and in some companies results in cookies from the scrum parent. But the ultimate test is whether the company is meeting its goals.
...
- 1,698
133
votes
Accepted
Dealing with failed sprints and deadlines
I see several fundamental management issues in your example:
if a Scrum-Addicts manager signs a "hard-deadline" contract, but adds only a safety margin of 33% in a situation where "a new system is ...
- 184k
129
votes
Team constantly fails to meet sprint goals
Am I missing something?
YES!
You went 18 months - or somewhere in the neighborhood of 36 sprints with retrospectives, but somehow couldn't fix it? Management didn't hold the team accountable, and ...
- 107k
105
votes
How do I prevent Scrum from turning great developers into average developers?
How do I prevent scrum from turning great developers into average developers?
By doing it correctly. All those horror stories I read, being it yours or the other answers, only tell me one thing: ...
- 6,845
89
votes
Accepted
How do you handle integrating code from multiple branches/developers each sprint?
If you are using Git, each developer would be pulling from the develop branch into their own feature branch so that they ensure they don't go too far from the current baseline. They can do that daily,...
- 44.8k
84
votes
Accepted
How to develop excellent software with agile methods?
The formal answer is you misunderstood agile, agile does not dictate requirements, stakeholders do. The core of agile is not to carve your requirements in stone but rather have them emerge as you go, ...
- 15.4k
77
votes
How to develop excellent software with agile methods?
There doesn't even seem to be a place for attractive qualities in agile.
You are comparing apples and oranges. In traditional waterfall, if your requirements say you need the must-haves, you get a ...
- 6,845
77
votes
My project manager does not accept carry-over in Scrum - is that normal?
A few things stand out to me.
The idea that management has that the team commits to a set of work is inconsistent with the latest versions of the Scrum Guide. The word "commit" or "commitment" is ...
- 75.6k
74
votes
Should non-priority technical debt tickets be pruned from backlog?
You are considering deleting the records of genuine problems with the codebase because the product owner wants a shorter backlog?
For me, the only reason to delete (close) an item in the backlog is ...
- 872
69
votes
Accepted
Does Scrum create additional overhead for projects where requirements don't change?
I believe that it's a faulty assumption to say that there are projects where the requirements don't change. Having worked in both the defense industry and the pharmaceutical industry making software, ...
- 75.6k
67
votes
Dealing with failed sprints and deadlines
One of the value statements of the "Manifesto for Agile Software Development" is :
Customer collaboration over contract negotiation
The fact that Scrum-Addicts LLC negotiated a contract instead of ...
- 35.5k
66
votes
How do I deal with a counterproductive scrum team?
In my experience, teams who are disillusioned need to start by having effective retrospectives. That's why in my opinion retrospectives are the only mandatory part of an agile process. Everything ...
- 144k
66
votes
How do I prevent Scrum from turning great developers into average developers?
Scrum is a process framework defined in the official scrum guide, which says, among other things, the following things about the daily scrum:
The Daily Scrum is a 15-minute time-boxed event for the ...
- 3,768
61
votes
Team constantly fails to meet sprint goals
My question is basically: when is it fair to look for the problem in the quality of the developers
There isn't enough information in your post to answer that question. There's no way to know if they ...
- 24.8k
60
votes
Accepted
How to coordinate developers time between two different projects in Scrum?
This problem is as old as scrum. There is a solution, but you won't like it.
Put new tasks on the backlog.
Don't interrupt developers.
Wait for the next sprint.
Putting your devs in more than one ...
- 64.1k
56
votes
Agile - What we doing wrong?
This has nothing to do with Agile or Scrum.
The problem with "duct tape it now and we'll fix it later" is that later never comes and in the mean time you are accumulating a lot of technical debt.
...
- 13.8k
53
votes
Accepted
Can the Scrum method be used with only one person and only one 10 day Sprint?
In this case I would simplify to Kanban. Kanban simply has a backlog that you work off, so there is no need to organize work into sprints. It's best not to over-complicate things. Considering this ...
- 44.8k
53
votes
Accepted
Un-ticketed work, how much is too much?
If you work in a company that doesn't place any value in paying down technical debt, you may have no choice but to do unticketed work.
Stakeholders are generally not qualified to make decisions about ...
- 195k
51
votes
What is the role of the lead developer in an agile team?
Nothing in agile changes how the lead developer should function. They should be involving the rest of the team with system architecture decisions, and technical direction no matter what development ...
- 13k
50
votes
Accepted
Scrum - What are team members busy with during a sprint
At the beginning of the sprint there is nothing to test yet
Really? You have no requirements to validate? No discussions to have with your customer? No wire-frames to evaluate? No test plans to think ...
- 2,953
47
votes
How do I deal with a counterproductive scrum team?
Ok so let's start rough - big part of the problem is with you - You hear, but you don't listen. Your team is telling you clearly what the problems are. You need to address them instead of blaming your ...
43
votes
Accepted
Why do we use the word "sprint"?
In other words it's not sustainable.
Right.
You don't run a sprint for months at a time in most Agile (well functioning ones, I'm sure some "we wanted buzzwords so we're an Agile waterfall shop" do)...
- 12k
43
votes
Should a (junior) developer try to push for better processes and practices in their development/IT team?
Yes but with a lot of care!
Let me clarify that.
You should strive to improve the habitability of the software. If you look at the code/team/business/project/management and your first response is to ...
- 15.4k
37
votes
Is Scrum incompatible with public tenders?
Scrum is probably not appropriate for this organization.
From the Scrum Guide, "Scrum is a framework for developing, delivering, and sustaining complex products." It's also designed for a team of 3-9 ...
- 75.6k
36
votes
How do I prevent Scrum from turning great developers into average developers?
I'd like to present a counterpoint to most of the answers. As a software developer, I've thrived in Agile teams.
Working with a crossfunctional team gave me a better understanding of the features we ...
- 486
36
votes
Should non-priority technical debt tickets be pruned from backlog?
I agree with Dan Saunders's answer, but I'm going to go one step further.
I agree that the only reason to close a request for a new feature or a modification to an existing feature is if the change ...
- 75.6k
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible