“Scrum. A revolutionary project management method. Book in 15 minutes

Recently we in MakeRight.ru read with pleasure the book “Scrum. A revolutionary project management method. ”Jeff Sutherland. What is she talking about? In a nutshell - how to organize a coordinated teamwork.
Having begun to introduce elements of the scram into practice, we concluded that the ideas of the book really work.

Is this a revolutionary method as indicated in the title? We do not know. But, perhaps, those who have not read the book and are not familiar with the methodology, will draw for themselves a number of useful ideas from our summar (brief presentation). So…

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What is scrum. The essence of the technique

“ Tear up your business cards. Get rid of titles and titles, from managers and hierarchical structures. Give people the freedom to do what they think is right, and the ability to take responsibility for it. The results will amaze you . ”

Those involved in project management, and simply management, know well how difficult it is to organize a well-coordinated team work. Due to the lack of coherence, plans are constantly violated, there is a backlog from the schedule, the project budget is swelling, money and time flow through your fingers, tasks of different departments are duplicated, people argue and do not help each other, although it would seem that their efforts are aimed at achieving one goal . In addition, customers are often dissatisfied with the final version of the created product.

The Scrum technique, developed by Jeff Sutherland and Ken Schwaber, is designed to solve all these problems. Scrum is the opposite of the classic phased approach applied to project implementation. The Scrum method has been adopted by many companies from both the technology industries, where it comes from, and from the traditional and even non-commercial ones. The approach that underlies the Scrum methodology can be applied in various types of activities that require teamwork.

Important characteristics of Scrum are its flexibility and focus on the client, as it assumes his (client) direct participation in the process of work.

Scrum does not require the introduction of any expensive tools. Scrum methodology can be briefly described as follows:

1. First you need to choose a “Product Owner” - a person who has a vision of what you are going to create or achieve.
2. Then you need to assemble a "team", which will include people who directly perform the work. They must have the skills and knowledge to help bring the product owner’s idea to life.
3. It is necessary to choose the “Scrum Master” - the one who will monitor the progress of the project, ensure that short meetings are held and help the team eliminate obstacles to achieving the goal.
4. Getting started, you need to create a complete list of all the requirements for the product or purpose. Items in this list should be prioritized. The list is called "Backlog product". It can develop and change throughout the life of the project.
5. Team members must evaluate each item in terms of their complexity and costs required to complete it.
6. Then the participants, the scrum master and the product owner must hold the first scrum meeting at which they will schedule a sprint - a specific time to complete part of the tasks. The duration of the sprint should not exceed one month. For each sprint team gains a certain number of points. The team must constantly strive to surpass in the new sprint the number of accumulated points for the previous sprint, that is, its goal is to constantly exceed its own results - “to increase the dynamics of performance”.
7. In order for all participants to be aware of the state of affairs, you need to create a skram-board with three columns: “You need to do it, or backlog”; "In work"; "Made." Participants glue stickers with tasks on the board, which in the process of work are alternately moved from the column “Backlog” to the column “in work” and then into the “done”.
8. Daily scrum meeting. According to Jeff Sutherland, "this is the pulse of the whole Scrum process." Its essence is simple - every day, on the go, fifteen minutes for everyone to give answers to three questions: “What did you do yesterday to help the team complete the sprint?”, “What are you going to do today to help the team complete the sprint?” , "What obstacles stand in the way of the team?".
9. At the end of the sprint, the team makes a review - holds a meeting at which the participants tell what was done during the sprint.
10. After showing the results of the work for the sprint, the participants hold a retrospective meeting at which they discuss what the team did well, what can be done better, what can be improved right now.

Disadvantages of a traditional project management approach

As the author of the book, Jeff Sutherland, notes, the traditional approach to the implementation of projects in the form of a cascade model, which involves a phased approach to the goal, has many drawbacks. The whole process is very slow, often unpredictable difficulties arise and, moreover, it often happens that the contractor creates a product that does not satisfy the customer at all.

The cascade model involves the use of Gantt charts - graphs, which indicate the stages of work and the time for their execution. The progress of the project is detailed and reflected every step of the work. It is assumed that each phase of the project is successively transferred to another - this is the principle of the cascade.


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“ With the proliferation of personal computers in the 1980s, it became easier to create various intricate diagrams — and make them truly complex — they turned into genuine works of art. The whole course of the project is detailed. Every single step. Any stage. Any delivery date. Indeed, Gantt charts make a deep impression. There is only one problem: they are always wrong - without exception . "

Why? As Jeff Sutherland notes, Henry Gant invented such diagrams back in 1910. They became widespread in the First World War. However, “everyone who has studied the history of this war knows that neither the training of human resources nor the organization’s system have ever been its strengths. I can’t understand why the concept of World War I becomes a de facto analytical design tool and is used even in the 21st century. We have abandoned the principles of positional warfare, but somehow its “trench” organizational ideas remain popular to this day. ”

In modern conditions, this scheme is inappropriate and similar to the model of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU, which "believed" the reports it received on the eve of the collapse of the Soviet Union and which had little to do with the real state of affairs.

“ Today, as in those years, reports continue to be more important than reality — and they, apparently, are called upon to describe it — but if inconsistencies suddenly surface, then they assign a guilty reality, not a diagram .”

Plans crumble to dust. The alternative is Scrum

There is a need for plans, but according to Jeff Sutherland, to follow them is extremely stupid, because when confronted with reality, all the beautiful tables and graphs crumble into dust. Therefore, it is so important to introduce into the work the possibility of changes, discoveries and the realization of new ideas, which is what happens in Scrum. Using this technique, it is possible to eliminate errors at the earliest stage, since in Scrum the work is carried out in short cycles - sprints, and also to maintain constant communication with the customer, which eliminates the creation of a product that is not needed by him.

The author notes that while creating his methodology, he, first of all, looked at how successful teams work, and did not listen to what they say.

The word scrum (“scramble”) was borrowed from a rugby game. It “ denotes a team game method that allows you to seize the ball and lead it further along the field, and this requires coherence, unity of intentions and a clear understanding of the goal. "Fight" is an ideal model for the complete interaction of players . " And this is exactly what is required for successful teamwork.


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In contrast to the traditional approach, which assumes controllability and predictability, drawing up plans, tables and diagrams that never work, the Scrum technique makes it possible to achieve goals in clearly marked and short cycles (sprints).

“ Each sprint is planned in advance at special meetings. Participants estimate how much work they think they can do, say, over the next two weeks. From the list of tasks, prioritized, they select the next unit of work to be performed, write them on stickers, which are glued to the wall. The group decides how many units of work they are able to complete for the upcoming sprint.
At the final stage of the sprint, the participants get together again and show each other what was achieved during the joint work. They look at how many units of work listed on the stickers are really brought to the end. Not everything can be done? This means that too many tasks were selected for this sprint. It happens the opposite - an insufficient number of tasks. In this case, something else is important: the group develops a sense of its own speed . ”

When all participants share their work results, the team begins to sort out everything that was done during the sprint, but not focusing on the discussion of the product, but on how it was done. “ How to improve cooperation in the next sprint? What prevented the last sprint? Because of what we are not moving as fast as we want? "- these are the questions that they put before themselves ."

This approach allows all participants to interact effectively with both the customer and with each other, to understand the correctness of their direction, the correspondence of the subsequent work to the tasks set, to take into account the errors found in the sprint.

As Jeff Sutherland notes, through the use of Scrum, groups learn to achieve "superefficiency" by raising their productivity by three hundred or four hundred percent.

Scrum philosophy

In the Scrum method, the author’s fascination with Japanese martial arts was reflected. According to him, in Japan “ Scrum is not regarded as a momentary fad. The Japanese regard Scrum as an approach to solving problems, as a course of action, as a way of being of existence - in general, as a way of life. When I teach people this technique, I often talk about my many years of experience in the Japanese martial art of aikido . ”

The common thing in Aikido and Scrum is that they can be mastered only in the process of work, when “your body, your mind and your spirit are united into a single whole through constant practice and striving for perfection. Being engaged in aikido, we comprehend the concept of shuhari (Shu Ha Ri) - this is at the same time a concept of martial arts, and an indicator of the level of skill. ”

The essence of teamwork in Scrum

Scrum is, above all, teamwork. The author identifies three characteristics of the best teams:

• the ongoing search for excellence;
• autonomy - the ability to self-organize;
• multifunctionality. The presence of different specialists and a culture of interaction and mutual assistance.

On multifunctionality it is worth to focus attention especially. The author gives an example of a multi-functional command from special forces - the group "Alpha" (team "A"). Each such " team" A "is formed in such a way that all its members are versatile masters of combat training, which allows them to perform operations from beginning to end. Special Forces soldiers are constantly conducting interchangeability training in several specialties. The team must be sure that if they kill both doctors, for example, a communications specialist will be able to provide first aid to a wounded comrade. The essential feature that distinguishes the work of special forces from the actions of "ordinary" army forces is that the "green berets" independently carry out both the collection of intelligence data and the planning of operations. In their practice, the transfer of the baton from one division to another is not allowed, because it is precisely in these “seams” that the weak spot lurks, which causes errors ”.

What size should the team be? Jeff Sutherland recommends small groups - about seven people. He cites data that if the group consists of more than nine people, then the speed of its work falls.

In addition, the author recalls the "Brooks Act":

" If the project does not fit the deadlines, then adding labor will delay it even more ."

The team leader is the scrum master. His duty is to ensure short meetings, their openness, help the group to go through obstacles that hinder the work, lead the team along the path of continuous improvement "and regularly look for the answer to the question" How can we do even better what we are already doing well? ".

No multitasking

The author warns against multitasking - in fact, it does not exist, our brain cannot perform two actions at the same time, it simply switches between tasks, and the total execution time of each of them is increased compared to if we performed them alternately. The Scrum technique assumes that it is necessary to perform all the tasks one by one, and not “to conduct five projects in a balanced way at the same time”.

“ By acting in the traditional way, that is, trying to do everything at once, the group will complete its three projects by the end of July. If the group gets to work, armed with a flexible strategy, such as Scrum, and will work alternately on each project, minimizing the time and effort spent on context switching, it will be able to finish everything by early May . ”

No rework

Tired employees become more scattered and do their jobs worse. The lack of energy leads to the fact that people make more impulsive and wrong decisions, and their efficiency decreases.

“ This phenomenon is dubbed the“ ego depletion ”. The idea is that making any decision requires you to energy costs. This is a strange kind of exhaustion - you do not feel physically tired, but your ability to make informed decisions decreases. What really changes is our self-control — our ability to be disciplined, thoughtful, and to calculate the consequences . ”

Conclusion: rest after work, completely away from work, recharge with pleasant impressions.

“ The Scrum methodology implies that those who use it stop measuring their work only for hours. Hours reflect only costs. Measure better result. Who cares how much time it took to do something? The only thing that matters is how quickly and efficiently it was done . ”

The essence of the work - the flow

Scrum helps to get into the "stream" - the state of highest concentration, when you do what you need, without spending effort on it, not forcing yourself and not urging. The author believes that the main thing for successful work is to reach and manage this state. “In your work, you need to achieve the main thing - flow control, which does not require any effort. In martial arts or meditative practices, we achieve a sense of unity in movement that does not require effort — this is the energy that flows freely through us. When you look at great dancers or singers, you feel how they submit to this energy. To achieve this state, we must strive in our work. "

How to achieve it? Behind the state of flow is internal discipline.

" There should not be a single movement for nothing ."

Scrum and happiness

People want to be happy. But Jeff Sutherland is sure that happiness is not inactive stagnation, but a bright, rich and active life. Scrum contributes to a happy life, as it helps to work and act fruitfully.

At the end of each sprint, the participants arrange a retrospective meeting where they talk about their work and move the considered tasks into the “Done” column, and then discuss what is good and what can be improved. They find the main obstacle and think how to eliminate it in the next sprint. This is the solution to the problem of continuous improvement.

“ Analyzing only the performance indicators, you will never know about the future slowdown, until the situation gets out of control. But if you closely follow the happiness index and notice its fall in the team, then you immediately notice a future threat, even if the performance continues to increase. You are warned about the problem and are going to deal with it as soon as possible . ”

Scram elements

Sprints

As noted above, at the beginning of the sprint and to ensure openness and clarity, you need to have a special board and divide it into three columns: “Backlog”; "In work"; "Made." Before each sprint, team members stick stickers with tasks into the “Backlog” column, which, in their opinion, they can perform for the sprint. During the sprint, any member of the team, holding the task, paste the sticker from the “Backlog” section into the “In Work” column. After completing the task - in the column “Made”. Thus, everyone sees what other participants are working on now.


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However, there is an important remark - “nothing is transferred to the column“ Done ”until this part of the project is tested by the client”.

“ Another important aspect of the sprint: as soon as the team approves the list of requirements, the tasks from this list are“ blocked ”. No one has the right to change or add them . ”

The author recommends this because any intervention will slow down the work of the team.

Daily meetings

The point is that they were held standing, every day, at the same time, their duration did not exceed fifteen minutes and the participants asked the same three questions: “What did you do yesterday to help the team finish the sprint?” , “What will you do today to help the team complete the sprint?”, “What obstacles stand in the way of the team?”.

Do to the end

In Scrum, it is important to learn how to feel the rhythm of the team. The worst case scenario is when something is half done at the end of the sprint. It is better not to start this business at all then.

" Resources, forces, time, money were spent, but a fully functioning product was not received ."

Scrum Planning

How is the planning process in Scrum? First you need to make a list of all the things that affect your goal. After that, prioritize them. If you do not fit into the time and financial framework, then you can more easily eliminate the last items in the list.

What to do next? Each item in the list should be evaluated on the subject of how much time, time and other resources will be spent on its implementation. How to make an assessment? The author offers a scale of relative ratings. For example, you can compare tasks "in dogs". Is the problem a dachshund or a retriever? Or maybe a dog?

But in any case it is more convenient to set numeric values. For example, “ Dachshund is a unit; mastiff - thirteen; the labrador became the top five, and the bulldog became the top three . ”

The author also suggests using an interesting poker planning technique. Its essence - each participant in the planning process is given a deck of cards with Fibonacci numbers - 1, 3, 5, 8, 13, and so on. Each item on the list, a unit of work that needs to be assessed, is laid out on the table. “Then each group member takes the card, the number on which, in his opinion, corresponds to the amount of effort required, and puts it face down on the table. Then everyone simultaneously opens the cards. If the discrepancy is not more than two cards (say, five, two eights and thirteen), the team simply adds them up, takes the arithmetic average (in this case, 6.6) and proceeds to the next task. Remember, we are talking about grades, not hard plans. And estimates of small fragments of the project. If the discrepancy turns out to be more than three cards, then those who put the cards with the largest and smallest value explain why they think so. Then another round of planning poker is held. Otherwise, they only average the estimates, which will make the results too approximate. ”

Requirements are stories

In order to successfully and clearly understand all to formulate a list of requirements for the product and create a backlog, Scrum uses an extraordinary approach. Instead of a simple list of tasks, user stories are compiled - short stories that contain the wishes of users of the final product.

“ Imagine that you are making the wish of the user of Amazon.com.” The trial version looks like this: “As a consumer, I need the world's largest book store where I can buy any book at any time.”

This description is quite in keeping with the character of Amazon, but the story was too vague to do anything with it. We need to fragment our history. Make it really very specific and functional. Here are some sample user stories you can write, referring to an online bookstore:

• As a consumer, I find it convenient to search for books by genre in order to quickly find the ones I like to read.
• As a consumer, when I select books for purchase, I want to put each in the basket at once.
• As a new product manager, I want to be able to track the purchases of our customers in order to be aware of which books they can offer.

Here are the professionally made wishes of the user, the nature of which the group should take into account . ”

User history should be complete, independent of various circumstances, implemented in practice. These criteria speak about the readiness of history. It is also important that the story can be assessed for its feasibility.

How to plan a sprint

In Scrum, the planning process takes place at the beginning of each new sprint and is called “sprint planning”.

“ Everyone gets together, browsing the list of user stories that are already in line for execution; find out how many tasks each team member can undertake; carefully weigh whether they will be able to complete the selected tasks for this sprint; whether they will be able to demonstrate the made units of work to the customer and show him the finished functions of the product; can they say to themselves at the end of the sprint that they have managed everything ”.

After this, the team together says: “Go!” - and gets to work

But what is work? Routine obyazalovka? From the point of view of scrum, work is history. What does it mean? This means that you should introduce a person who needs what you are doing; then what it is, and finally, why do people need it.

Teams need to know their dynamics well - how much work they can do in one sprint. This will help her work smarter and eliminate all obstacles in her path.

“ Dynamics x time = result. Knowing how fast you are moving, you can understand when you are at the finish . ”

Openness in everything

Scrum implies transparency of all actions and processes.

This is expressed in a three-column blackboard, to which all team members have access.

“ Secrecy is poison. Nothing can be kept secret. Everyone should know everything, including financial data. Tangling trails is necessary only for those who seek their own benefit . ”

Prioritization

This chart must be borne in mind every entrepreneur. The essence of the work is to find the golden mean - a balanced concept between the three extremes:

• You highlight what you can offer. Then there is a risk to make anyone an unnecessary product;
• You are targeting the market. Then you can get ahead or destroy competitors;
• Your main aspiration is big sales. Then you risk putting a mediocre product on the market.

Backlog

As already noted, backlog in a scram is a list of requirements and functions of a product, ordered by importance of tasks. It may contain hundreds of tasks or more.

“ The meaning of backlog compilation is the creation of the most complete listing of requirements for product functions. In fact, no one is going to carry out each item in a row, but such a document, containing everything that could in principle be included in the project concept, should always be at hand. Some requirements are selected first . ”

How to prioritize?

“For this you need to find out which list items:

• are most important for the progress of the project;
• most important for the customer or future consumer;
• will bring the maximum income;
• easiest to implement. "

Jeff Sutherland points out that it’s important to remember that there are always tasks on the list that you can never do. You need to choose those that bring the maximum benefit with minimal risk.

Product Owner

There are three roles in the scram: Scrum-team - performers of specific projects; Scrum master is the one who follows the project and helps the team solve problems, and the product owner is the one who solves the concept of the product and makes backlog.

“The master scrum and the team are responsible for what the pace of their work will be and how quickly they will complete the project. The product owner is responsible for ensuring that effective teamwork becomes a profitable result . ” The product owner must know the market perfectly and must have the authority to make decisions.

This may be too much responsibility for one person, so a team of product owners can work on large projects.

Minimizing risks in the scrum

Since the scram provides for the step-by-step delivery of the project, this helps minimize the risks. This helps to quickly show the customer the product and receive feedback from it.

“ The Scrum methodology is useful for business by quickly answering the question: can we make money if we do this or that?” "

You do not need to spend huge amounts of money before you realize that something is not working.

How to implement Scrum now

Jeff Sutherland advises starting with collecting the team and compiling backlog. You need to make up the concept of your product and start crushing it into tasks. It is not necessary that all requirements be immediately added to backlog - you can select a week for this. “ As long as your team members hold daily meetings on the go and first sprints, you will be able to create a rather voluminous backlog during this time to have something to take the team a few sprints ahead. Do not forget to look into it more often, because the team will start to accelerate the pace and will carry out more work than you planned at the very beginning . ”

After that, make a proposed plan of action: ask questions: what can you do for the next few months? What do you want to achieve by the end of the year? "It is important to remember that this is just a freeze frame, so do not get too carried away with planning, just sketch out the options. You do not draw up a binding contract, but simply write down your own thoughts, which you will be able to achieve in some time. Believe me, the picture will change. Perhaps even in a radical way . ”

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