SCRUM — The Agile Framework
We work at PPL C6 as a SCRUM Team
This isn’t the first time I become a part of a SCRUM Team. The first time is when I was an intern at GDP Labs as a Software Development Engineer. That time, I don’t really understand and care about the development flow. The second time is when having an internship at Badr Interactive. This time I was paying closer attention to how SCRUM is implemented in a professional environment. One of the reason is that I also lead a developer team of an organization at my faculty and tried to implement a good development process. And this — at PPL C6 team — is the third time I was on a SCRUM Team.
Scrum (n): A framework within which people can address complex adaptive problems, while productively and creatively delivering products of the highest possible value.
SCRUM is an Agile Development Framework. It often compared with Waterfall which behaves the opposite of Agile Development and Extreme Programming (XP) which also an Agile Development Framework but with slightly different implementations.
As an Agile Framework, SCRUM is focusing on developing things by delivering usable increments on each cycle. There’s also evaluation on each cycle which makes the next development (as process and product) better. This type of development is implemented by many software development teams which the requirement change quite often.
An official guide of SCRUM is available at scrumguides.org.
SCRUM consist of 3 main elements:
- SCRUM Team
- SCRUM Events
- SCRUM Artifacts
For me, these three elements are like a grammar structure: subject, predicate, object. SCRUM Team members are interacting with SCRUM Artifacts by doing SCRUM Events.
A SCRUM Team consists of 3 roles:
- Product Owner
- Development Team
- SCRUM Master
Product Owner is a representative of the product. Although the product is owned by a committee, it should be only one person who represents the committee desire. He is responsible for maximizing the value of increments delivered by the Development Team.
Development Team is the one who implements the increments for the product. Development Team must be self-organizing and cross-functional. Self-organizing means they decide how they work on their own while cross-functional means they have all the competencies for delivering the product’s increments. Although the team members have their own specialized skills and area of focus, there shouldn’t be any titles or sub-team on a Development Team.
SCRUM Master works as servant-leader (a leadership philosophy where the leader serves the team needs) for the SCRUM Team. He is the one who makes sure the SCRUM Team understand and implement the SCRUM correctly. The SCRUM Master also facilitate the SCRUM Events throughout the development.
SCRUM Events consists of:
- The Sprint
- Sprint Planning
- Daily SCRUM Meeting
- Sprint Review
- Sprint Retrospective
Each of SCRUM Events has its own time box that limits the event duration. Except for The Sprint itself, other SCRUM events may end before the time box is reached. This ensures there’s no time wasted for efficiency.
The Sprint is where the Development Team works the increments. It time boxed at most one month. All of other SCRUM Events are live inside of a sprint. Each sprint has its own goals which proposed by the Product Owner and agreed upon the Development Team. Throughout The Sprint, the Development Team must move towards the Sprint Goals.
Sprint Planning is where The Sprint is planned. There are two main topics must be discussed in this event: “What can be done this Sprint?” and “How will the chosen work get done?”. The time box of this event is 8 hours for one month Sprint.
Daily SCRUM Meeting is held every day with the time box of only 15 minutes. It helps the SCRUM Team communicate with each other, eliminate other meetings, identify impediments to development for removal, highlight and promote quick decision-making, and improve the Development Team’s level of knowledge.
Sprint Review is an inspection event where the work of the Development Team are reviewed by the SCRUM Team and the stakeholders. While Sprint Review inspects the product increments, Sprint Retrospective inspect how the team works during The Sprint. Both Sprint Review and Sprint Retrospective give the SCRUM Team advice for better development for the next Sprints.
SCRUM Artifacts:
- Product Backlog
- Sprint Backlog
- Definition of Done
Product Backlog is a list of product needs proposed by the Product Owner. Each item in Product Backlog must be defined clearly and ordered based on the priority. The Item that chosen at the Sprint Planning is moved to the Sprint Backlog list.
Each Backlog Item has quality measures called Definition of Done which should be applied on each implementation of the Backlog Items. This quality measures can be negotiated with the Product Owner before The Sprint is running, but throughout The Sprint, the quality measures shouldn’t decrease.
SCRUM is a framework, not a process nor a definitive method nor a technique. This means you can add any works needed as long as the works are not violating the SCRUM guides. As long I work with SCRUM, I’ve met some of terminologies which I thought are a SCRUM defined work, such as Epic, Task, Spike, etc.
