I was too lax recently when a Scrum Team ran low and picked up some additional Stories. The quick email discussion going over the Stories was probably insufficient to get unanimous buy-in and a Failed Sprint might have been avoided.
Moving forward, I will always have a mini-Sprint Planning Meeting when any new Stories are considered.
One of the things we’ve been tracking is Pass or Fail for a Sprint All the work you set out to do was done? Pass. You missed a Story? Fail. There’s no associated reward or punishment but the teams get pretty serious about it.
A Sprint ended Friday and the Team was patting themselves on the back for their Pass even though at 7:30 PM the Team was still scrammbling to wrap up 3 Tasks. One of the engineers had to cancel dinner plans and was working alone at the office feeling solely responsible for the team’s success.
So now I get be the mean ScrumMaster and give them a big ol’ Fail and explain that the planning and estimates should not require last minute heroics and all-nighters.
I’m adding to my ScrumMaster checklist: Put a clear deadline in Exchange noting the date and hour of the Pass/Fail deadline. I’m a chump for not doing that automatically.
I’ve been tasked with converting ValueClick Media’s software development process to Scrum. I’m filling the role of ScrumMaster for two teams. We’ve settled on two-week Sprints and have completed two Sprints so far. It’s still early but the transition had gone surprisingly smooth.