How to Conduct an Effective Sprint Review?
In the recent articles, we have talked about what is a sprint and how to plan it. In this article, we will talk about sprint review and how to make it more effective. Basically, a sprint review is a scrum event that takes place at the end of the sprint, just before the retrospective. The purpose of it is to inspect the outcome of the sprint and determine future adaptations. It is believed to increase visibility, control, and risk management.
A sprint review allows the whole scrum team to get together with all the stakeholders to decide the best way forwards. Technically, in a sprint review, the scrum team demonstrates the product increment to stakeholders, has a discussion about the product goals and gathers feedback.
Who must Attend the Sprint Review Meeting?
The product owner
A product owner (PO) is a member of the Agile Team who is responsible for maximizing the value delivered by the team and ensuring that the Team Backlog is aligned with customer and stakeholder needs. In a sprint review, PO invites all the attendees, including the scrum team and the key stakeholders. PO also makes a link between the business needs and the technology strategy to enable the team to balance the multiple stakeholders while continuously evolving the solution.
A scrum master
A scrum master is the facilitators of scrum. They shall be committed to the scrum foundation and values, but remain flexible and open to opportunities for the team to improve their workflow. In a sprint review, a scrum master captures the feedback from the stakeholders.
Developer team
A developer team consists of a lead, business analysts, developers, and quality assurance engineers (QA). In the sprint review, the dev team discuss what went well, what was the problem, and how it was solved. They also demonstrates the work “Done” and answer questions about the increments.
Any stakeholders
A stakeholder is a person external to the scrum team with a specific interest in and knowledge of a product that is required for incremental discovery. Stakeholders are actively engaged with the scrum team at sprint review. They are the key of the sprint review and provide feedback of the scrum process.
The Purpose of a Sprint Review
As mentioned, and based on the Scrum Guide, the purpose of a sprint review is to inspect the outcome of the sprint and determine future adaptations. During the event, the scrum team and stakeholders review what was accomplished in the sprint and what has changed in their environment. Only completed work, according to the Definition of Done (DoD), is part of the increment and will be demonstrated. The unfinished sprint backlogs will not be demonstrated during the meeting. It should not even be a part of product increments. Any incomplete work will be put back in the product backlog. Product owner will know what to do next.
Now that we have established the purpose of a sprint review, how to conduct an effective sprint review?
Conducting an Effective Sprint Review
- Scrum master makes sure that the meeting takes place and the time-box is kept. Everyone in the meeting understands for the purpose.
- Sprint reviews are usually informal. Instead of slides, present your working software instead.
- The scrum team demonstrates the potentially releasable product increment to the stakeholders.
- Stakeholders give real-time feedback on the product and evaluate if the scrum team delivered on the sprint goal. Attendees ask questions during the demonstration.
- Any items that did not meet the Definition of Done (DoD) turned to the product backlog. Both the stakeholders and scrum team discuss how the feedback they received, and any new business context provided by the stakeholders, may impact the ordering of the product backlog.
- Rotate demonstration responsibilities amongst developers. Give everyone a chance to be on the stage.
*This article is written by Lydia Liliana, a Scrum Master
References:
https://www.zoho.com/sprints/sprint-reviews.html\
https://appliedframeworks.com/how-to-run-an-effective-sprint-review/
https://scrumguides.org/scrum-guide.html#sprint-review
https://platinumedge.com/the-effective-sprint-review
https://www.scrum.org/resources/what-is-a-sprint-review
https://agility.im/frequent-agile-question/what-is-a-sprint-review/
