Virtually yearly, on or round April 1, Mountain Goat Software program releases a brand new mock product for the agile business. This 12 months, we’re introducing the Scrum Police.
On the brand new, official Scrum Police web site you’ll be able to report crimes in opposition to Scrumanity, view a log of latest convictions, and even confess your personal crimes earlier than you might be turned in by your teammates.
Be part of the Enjoyable at ScrumPolice.com
The crimes vary from really foolish to somewhat bit detrimental to your workforce’s well-being. Listed here are just some examples of some that received’t actually land you or your workforce in jail, however I wouldn’t essentially suggest:
It’s enjoyable, it’s humorous, however it’s additionally surprisingly true.
Agile Is About Suggestions, Not Guidelines
The thought for Scrum Police got here from the truth that increasingly folks appear to need to codify agile right into a set of strict guidelines: “You could do that” or “When you do not do that or all of that then you definately’re not doing it proper.”
Right here’s my recommendation: Make suggestions not guidelines. There are only a few hard-and-fast guidelines to being agile:
Past that, it is far more about suggestions. And there are many issues we have discovered within the a number of many years now that agile processes have been round, even in casual varieties.
For instance, I like to recommend groups use consumer tales as their strategy to necessities. I like to recommend groups use story factors for estimating. I like to recommend that the workforce choose a day aside from Mondays for beginning their iterations. I like to recommend the Szechuan Hen at Spice China.
However none of these items is required for achievement with agile. Every could assist a workforce be higher, and I’ve causes I like to recommend every. However these items will not be required.
There Is No One True Approach to Be Agile–Or Is There?
It doesn’t matter what the Scrum Police say, there isn’t any good path to agility that works for each workforce, each time.
Like many issues in life, a number of approaches can work.
For instance, there are two equally handy routes from my home to the airport. The quickest is to take a toll street that passes a few mile from the home and goes on to the airport. However that prices $8. The opposite route takes about 10 minutes longer, however saves me these eight {dollars}. Typically I take the primary route. Different instances, I’ll take the second.
There’s nobody good means for me to get to the airport. Equally, there’s nobody good means for a workforce to be agile. Because of this agile is finest outlined by its ideas relatively than particular practices.
Regardless of this, there are individuals who suppose agile may be become a set of thou-must-do-it-this-way guidelines. Some folks inform me each workforce advantages from timeboxed iterations (sprints). Others insist that two-week sprints are at all times one of the best. A well-liked e book on Scrum insists that the day by day scrum have to be performed left to proper beginning with the particular person to the left of the ScrumMaster.
They don’t. They aren’t. And it shouldn’t.
Scrum is intentionally incomplete. Positive, some group of gurus might get collectively and resolve as soon as and for all what dash size is finest. They might resolve that every one sprints ought to begin on Tuesdays, and that groups should do pair programming on precisely 70 to 80 p.c of all code they write. However these are choices finest made by the workforce.
And similar to me en path to the airport, some groups will select a technique, and others will select one other. And that’s the way it must be.
So, maybe there’s one true strategy to do agile—the best way that works finest for every workforce.
And for many who don’t agree, there’s at all times the Scrum Police.
