dead zone (updated version with sprint zero section)
DESCRIPTION
Common Scrum practices offer various instruments for team work visualization: product/sprint backlog, daily standups, burndown/burnup charts. However, this tool set is rarely found sufficient for large project teams which are distributed between different locations and suffering time zones difference. How to understand whether backlog items prioritized correctly? Do teams understand priorities for next sprint and release? Are user stories refined enough for development? Many of these questions are often found in a "dead zone" which causes a lot of trouble with scaling. On top of that, many distributed teams often suffer from gaps in communication with business stakeholders. In this presentation I review a couple of practices for backlog structuring and visualization, using product discovery techniques for building shared understanding between all parts of distributed team, bottleneck identification and elimination, definitions of "done" for backlog items refinement process.TRANSCRIPT
Streamlining requirements flow in distributed projects
Dead Zone
Sergey Prokhorenko
Luxoft
3 October 2013
2 April 10, 2023
Agile at Luxoft
Experience
Since 2005 15+ customers 50+ ongoing projects 700+ Agile practitioners 100+ Certified Scrum Masters 15+ internal Agile Coaches
START NEW AGILE ENGAGEMENTS
TRANSITION EXISTING TO AGILE
PERFORMANCE BOOSTS
Agile Practice
DEDICATED CoE
BOTH LUXOFT AND CLIENT TEAMS
3 April 10, 2023
Agile as a Silver Bullet
Agile provides
Business value driven prioritizatio
n
Pay for DONE
Change without penalty
Client is in full control
of the project
Client problem
Always late with the
things we really need
Paying for the wrong
things
Too expensive to make even
little changes
Difficult to understand where we are right
now
vs
vs
vs
vs
Never45%
Rarely
19%
Some-times16%
Often13% Al-
ways7%
Actual use of requested features
Source: The CHAOS Manifesto, The Standish Group, 2011
4
Simple Rulebook
PO
Product Owner
Product Backlog
(Features)
Sprint Planning
Part 1(What?)
2-4 h
Sprint Planning
Part 2(How?)2-4 h
Sprint Backlog(Tasks)
Team
SM
Daily Scrum 15 min
Product Backlog Refinement
5-10% of Sprint
1 Day
2-4 weeks Sprint
Potentially Shippable Product Increment
Sprint Review2-4 h
Sprint Retrospective
1,5-3 h
Scrum Master
289 pages vs 16 pages
5
Not Every Rule is Easy to Follow
6
PO in a “Land of Milk and Honey” Responsible for maximizing the value
of the product and the work of the Development Team
Sole person responsible for managing the Product Backlog
– Power
– Expertise
– Dedication Does Sprint Planning and PBR with
the Development Team Tracks total work remaining at least
every Sprint Review
7
“Wake Up, Neo”
8
ScrumButt
9
Process Becomes Cargo Cult
10
How Did We End Up Like This?
PO
Product Owner
Product Backlog
(Features)
Sprint Planning
Part 1(What?)
2-4 h
Sprint Planning
Part 2(How?)2-4 h
Sprint Backlog(Tasks)
Team
SM
Daily Scrum 15 min
Product Backlog Refinement
5-10% of Sprint
1 Day
2-4 weeks Sprint
Potentially Shippable Product Increment
Sprint Review2-4 h
Sprint Retrospective
1,5-3 h
Scrum Master
PO
Product Owner
Product Backlog
(Features)
Sprint Planning
Part 1(What?)
2-4 h
Sprint Planning
Part 2(How?)2-4 h
Sprint Backlog(Tasks)
Team
SM
Daily Scrum 15 min
Product Backlog Refinement
5-10% of Sprint
1 Day
2-4 weeks Sprint
Potentially Shippable Product Increment
Sprint Review2-4 h
Sprint Retrospective
1,5-3 h
Scrum Master
New stories (no time to
PBR!)
No sprint commitment! L
11
Sprint-Level Visualization
12
13
Developers
Dead Zone
What is the goal of current release?
Are we on track to deliver it on time?
What are other teams doing?
Are there any dependencies on a project level?
Does PO or BA have enough requirements?
Management
Are we on track to deliver release scope on time?
When release epics will be ready and what is the current status?
What are PO (BA, pPO) doing? Do they have any blockers?
How many stories are ready for the next sprint?
Are we ready for the next release planning?
14
Interactions and People
15
Divide and Conquer
If you don’t live in a “Land of Milk and Honey” –
THAT’S OK!
16
Clear Roles and Responsibilities
Prioritization
Communication
Expertise
17
Processes and Tools
18 April 10, 2023
Kanban at Project (Program) Level
19
High-level Flow
Request from
stakeholders
Backlog prioritizatio
n
Backlog refinement
Ready for developme
ntSprint Ready for
release
20
21
Value Stream Mapping
Request from
business sponsors
Program initiation
Project chartering
Epics breakdown
User story drafting
User story grooming
Ready for sprint
In developmen
t
Ready for demo
Ready for UAT In UAT Ready for
release
22 April 10, 2023
DoD Agreements (Analysis Phases)
Program initiation
• PID is shared with BAs
• Project charter is drafted and shared with business sponsors and BAs
Project chartering
• Charter is approved by business sponsors
• Final charter is reviewed with BAs in a meeting
Epics breakdown
• Charter breakdown into epics is approved by PO
• All epics are described in Confluence with:• Business
context• Problem
statement• High-level
acceptance criteria
• All epics are presented to the team(s)
• Epics are included into backlog and prioritized
• Business contacts identified
User story drafting
• User story is well-analyzed by BA and conform to INVEST criteria
• Detailed BDD scenarios are created
• Mockups are created (where applicable)
• Data requirements specified (if any)
• Business logic is specified (if any)
• US reviewed with business SME
• Acceptance criteria are reviewed by business SME
• US is prioritized in backlog and priority approved by PO
User story grooming
• Team reviewed and agreed that US conforms to INVEST criteria
• BDD acceptance scenarios are well understood by team and approved by business
• All research spikes identified and completed
• US breakdown is approved by team (and re-approved by business if any changes)
• Business contacts are shared with the team
• Design is approved
DoD for last analysis phase = DoR for sprint
23
Limit WIP
24 April 10, 2023
Backlog Grooming Ground Rules
• At least once a week, scheduled with PO• Started upfront (at least a week before planning)
Regular
• 15-20 min per story• If timebox isn’t enough – go offline and prepare for the next
session
Timeboxed
• All team members ask questions upfront• Team members (not only PO/pPO) describe story value and
scenarios
Includes whole team
• If artifact doesn’t follow agreed DoD it isn’t moved to the next phase
Strict DoD
25
Effective Collaboration
Feature Team US 1
Feature Team UA 2Feature Team US 2
Feature Team UA 1
Scrum of Scrums Scrum of Scrums
Cross-functional teams
Single backlog with unified estimates
Single Product Owner
Proxy Product Owners for each location
Joint release planning
26
Creating Backlog
27
Product Vision and Goals Tell me why Long term goals Shared understanding of business
28
Story Mapping
High level features Ordered from user perspective Marked with skills needed to
build
Actual actions performed Forming workflows Prioritizing by business value
29
Initial Backlog
30
Understanding Story Points
31
Working Agreements
Definition of Done Definition of Ready WIP limits Working schedule Everything else
32
What’s Next?
33
Big Picture
34
Anything Depends on Everything
vs
35
Inspect and Adapt!
36
Suggested Reading
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3 October 2013
Sergey Prokhorenko
Luxoft
ua.linkedin.com/in/sergeyprokhorenko