Scrum is a successful and solid Agile framework revolutionizing the face of project management and software development. Professionals are becoming more Agile with the help of Scrum. It is one of the most sought-after skills today, and LinkedIn calls ScrumMaster one of the promising jobs of 2021.
This Scrum tutorial will help you understand why Scrum is great and how you can get started with Scrum by covering all the core concepts like product backlog, team roles, sprints, burn-down charts, and more.
Scrum Tutorial - Table of Content |
A scrum is a lightweight framework used for effective product development. It is not a technique, method, or process; rather, it's a framework within which you can employ various processes and techniques. Scrum consists of teams and associated roles, artifacts, events, and rules. etc., and each component serves a specific purpose in the framework.
The product built-in the Scrum is prepared in a series of fixed-length iterations called sprints. A sprint is a short, time-boxed iteration that is of one to six weeks in duration that helps the scrum teamwork to convert a subset of user stories in the product backlog into shippable product functionalities.
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The below image outlines Scrum in Action by taking us from planning through software delivery.
In Scrum, prescribed events create regularity, and all the events are time-boxed so that each event has its maximum duration. In particular, there are four events in the scrum process, such as sprint planning, daily Scrum, sprint review, and sprint retrospective. In the later part of the tutorial, you'll get a clear idea about these events.
Scrum solves complex problems in work by making them transparent so that everyone can inspect and adjust based on the current conditions, rather than predicted conditions. Transparency of common standards and terms is needed to ensure what is being delivered.
Regular inspections ensure project progress and detect variances early. The basic Scrum events for inspection and adaptation are Sprint Planning, Sprint Review, Sprint Retrospective, and Daily Scrum.
Related Article: Agile Project Management With Scrum |
The five values that are the foundation for Scrum team processes are:
The Scrum Team consists of mainly three roles, namely a Product Owner, Scrum Master, and the Development Team.
Product Owner
The Product Owner is vital in Scrum development. Part of the product owner's responsibilities includes a vision of what customers want to build and conveying that vision to the scrum team. They directly interact with the customer, development team, and other central stakeholders and are responsible for decision-making.
The Scrum Master role is responsible to promote and support Scrum. They communicate all best scrum practices to the team, ensure they are followed, and facilitate the scrum activities. (sprint reviews, daily meetings, retrospectives)
Development Team
The Development Team(Scrum Team) determines how to accomplish the tasks set forth by the product owner. They are self-organizing and cross-functional to create a product increment.
Related Article: Agile Vs Scrum |
Let's understand the step-by-step process of how Scrum works with Jira software.
Step1: Create a Scrum project
Once the scrum project is created, you will land on the product backlog. The list of tasks that needs to be done in the project is called a product backlog. For any changes to be done on the product, the backlog is the single source through which requirements are added.
Throughout the whole development process, new tasks can be added to the product backlog. The Product Owner is liable for the Product Backlog, to its availability, content, and order.
Step2: Create user stories or tasks in the backlog
User stories describe the work items from the user's perspective in a non-technical language. Once the user stories are created, we can prioritize them in the backlog.
Related Article: Frequently Asked Scrum Interview Questions |
Step3: Create a Sprint
In Scrum, the team forecast to complete a set of user stories in a fixed time duration called a sprint. The optimal time mostly we set for a sprint is for two weeks.
The product owner sets the sprint goal. A sprint is also made up of individual tasks; the most complex can be further divided into smaller tasks, which usually can be performed in a few hours by any team member.
To create a Sprint, go to the backlog of your Scrum project, there you can find the Create sprint button at the top of your backlog. Click on it, and you will be moved to the screen to create a new Sprint. Note, more than one sprint can be created at the same time.
Step4: Hold the Sprint Planning Meeting
The first meeting to start the sprint is called a Sprint planning meeting. The product owner, scrum master, and the entire team members attend it to discuss the sprint goal and stories in the prioritized product backlog.
Step5: Start the Sprint in Jira
Once the issues are added to the sprint and the team is ready to work, you'll need to start the sprint. Once you start your sprint, you will be taken to the Active sprints tab in the project.
Step6: Hold the Daily Standup Meetings
Daily standup meetings inspect the progress of the Sprint goal and how progress is trending toward work completion in the sprint backlog. Daily scrum meetings are held every day of a sprint at the same time and location to reduce complexity.
The primary purpose of these meetings is to enhance team communication and collaboration, help all the team members, share their inputs, discover what needs improvement and stay updated.
Related Article: What is Scrum Methodology |
Step7: View the Burndown Chart
A graphical representation of how quickly the team is working through customers' user stories is called the Burndown chart. It estimates the actual and estimated amount of work to be done in a sprint.
Step8: Hold the Sprint Review Meeting
Sprint reviews take place at the end of the sprint and are specially designed for gathering actionable feedback on what the team has completed. Also, referred to as demos, which show the overall work to the team and inspect the roadmap for the product.
Step9: Hold the Sprint Retrospective Meeting
Sprint retrospectives are used to inspect and improvements to be performed in the next sprint. Sprint retrospectives occur before the next sprint planning and after the Sprint review.
Step10: Complete the Sprint in Jira
At the end of the sprint, click on the complete sprint.
The key benefits of using Scrum are:
Related Article: Scrum Master Roles and Responsibilities |
Let’s discuss some of the most popular Scrum tools that increase team productivity:
The following are the certifications offered for Scrum:
This is a basic certification to become a Professional Scrum Master. This certification includes three levels of assessments based on fundamental, advanced, and distinguished levels of Scrum mastery. Those who pass all three levels of PSM assessments will receive the corresponding industry-recognized certification.
Professional Scrum Product Owner:
This is a basic certification to become a Professional Scrum Product Owner. It validates and certifies your knowledge based on three levels of assessments (fundamental, advanced, and distinguished).
Professional Scrum Developer:
This is a basic certification to become a Scrum Developer. It tests your knowledge of how to build complex software products using Scrum.
Scaled Professional Scrum:
This certification is for those professionals who want to demonstrate their knowledge of scaling Scrum and the Nexus framework.
Professional Scrum with Kanban:
This certification is available to anyone who wishes to validate their knowledge of how Scrum Teams can use Scrum with Kanban's ability for supporting value creation and delivery.
Professional Scrum with User Experience:
This certification demonstrates your knowledge of integrating modern UX practices into Scrum and working effectively within Scrum teams.
[ Also Check out the Principles of Scrum ]
The scrum master career path allows one to build a career in various fields:
With this, we have come to the end of this Scrum Tutorial. We hope all the topics shared in this article are clear and help you get started with Scrum.
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Madhuri is a Senior Content Creator at MindMajix. She has written about a range of different topics on various technologies, which include, Splunk, Tensorflow, Selenium, and CEH. She spends most of her time researching on technology, and startups. Connect with her via LinkedIn and Twitter .