Product Backlog Grooming, what is it?

All you need to know about one of the key processes of managing projects in the modern agile era

In agile development, a product backlog (or backlog) is a list of all new features, bug fixes, improvements, changes to existing features, and other product initiatives that product teams must prioritize and deliver to strategically make a product come to life.

Which process can help us keeping the Backlog aligned, detailed and “clean”?

Here comes the Grooming

Already introduced in 2005, then formalized in 2011 inside the Scrum Guide, the procedures of refinement and cleaning of the Product Backlog (from which the term Grooming) have been added in the Scrum practices.

According to the 2011 version of the Scrum Guide, before starting the Sprint Planning Meeting, the Development Team and Product Owner meet for the “Grooming Meeting”, where they review the stories with the highest priority, clarify any doubts, understand if they have the correct size, and lastly, they update the Product Backlog adding new stories and deleting those completed or out of scope.