With the rapid pace of technological advancement, organizations need a more aggressive approach for faster time to market with quality deliveries and improved customer experience. That's why more and more organizations are turning to the Agile Scrum framework.
Agile Scrum offers a modernized way of project development and management, empowering organizations to reduce cycle time, release prioritized features iteratively, and value customer feedback during development. However, Scrum is not a straightforward project management framework. It involves specific structures, roles, and responsibilities that collectively lead to rewarding outcomes. Therefore, this article intends to cover all the basics of the Agile Scrum framework to help you understand its roles, responsibilities, and working principle.
Agile and Scrum are two words that are used interchangeably, and many think of them as the same thing. However, both are different. Agile is a broader approach to project management, while Scrum is a specific framework in Agile.
Think of Agile as a project management philosophy that involves continuous iterative development and testing of the product, emphasizing collaboration, flexibility, and adaptability.
Scrum is one of the Agile methodologies that emphasize delivering business value in the minimal time possible. It focuses on self-organized teams, sprint-based incremental releases, and a continuous feedback loop. In short, Scrum is a subset of Agile that follows a specific set of roles, events, and rules to implement Agile principles effectively.
The Agile Scrum framework is an amalgam of different dedicated roles and responsibilities that contribute to achieving the end goals. The details of each role and its corresponding responsibilities are as follows:
Scrum Master is the master of the Scrum framework. In simple words, Scrum Masters have been certified or trained in the Scrum methodology. The whole Scrum team relies on their knowledge to get guidance in various procedures. Their main responsibility is to ensure that the team follows the Scrum principles. This makes them serve as the facilitator of the Scrum team.
Responsibilities
In short, Scrum Master is the person in charge of the Scrum team and ensures the rightful implementation of Scrum during the whole project cycle.
The Product Owner is the one that oversees the whole product development process and ensures that valuable products are created as expected by the stakeholders. Basically, Product Owners are the voice of the stakeholders and customers and ensure that the product meets their needs. They are well familiar with the business workflows and the importance of prioritizing customer needs.
Responsibilities
In short, the Product Owner is the core Scrum team member who ensures that stakeholders/customers get valuable products.
The development team is the third crucial role in the Scrum Agile methodology, which comprises individuals with the necessary expertise and skills to develop the product. For instance, the development team to create a software application includes developers, testers, designers, analysts, etc. The team is responsible for executing the tasks required to deliver the product increment and works collaboratively to achieve the goals of each sprint.
Responsibilities
In short, the development team is responsible for bringing the product idea into reality by following all the best practices and principles of the Scrum framework.
Stakeholders are the ones that have a direct interest in the project's outcome and can influence its success. They are individuals or groups that provide input, feedback, and support during the whole project period.
Responsibilities
In short, stakeholders actively contribute to project success by providing input and feedback throughout the project.
Now that we have cleared the roles and responsibilities in an Agile Scrum framework, let's shed light on its working principle. The below steps clarify how a typical project proceeds from initiation to completion in Scrum:
The project starts with the creation of the product backlog. The Product Owner gathers the requirements from stakeholders and evaluates the market trends to formulate the product backlog. The backlog can include items like new features, bug fixes, upgrades of existing features, etc. The Product Owner also prioritizes the backlog.
The development team, Product Owner, Scrum Master, and key stakeholders sit together to estimate the efforts required to complete the backlog items. The development team uses Planning Poker, T-Shirt Sizing, Async Poker, Dot Voting, or any other estimation technique to estimate the efforts. This helps the team understand the backlog items, identify potential issues, and align on the effort required for each item.
The development team heads for its first sprint planning meeting, where the team picks the top priority items from the backlog, sets the sprint goals, formulates the sprint backlog, and finalizes the sprint duration. The number of items the team picks during the sprint planning meeting will be completed by the end of the sprint.
Once the sprint goals and objectives are finalized, the main job of the development team begins. The team collaboratively works on executing the tasks finalized in the sprint planning. During the sprint execution stage, the development team also follows the other Scrum principles, such as conducting daily standup meetings, ensuring continuous communication and collaboration, transparency, etc.
Once the development team has completed all the sprint backlog items within the designated sprint duration, it is time to conduct the sprint review. The sprint review is a collaborative meeting that involves the development team, Product Owner, Scrum Master, and relevant stakeholders. Its purpose is to demonstrate the completed increment, assessment of the work by the stakeholders, and gather feedback. Based on the response, the development team and Product Owner refine the product backlog for the upcoming sprints.
After the sprint review, the Scrum team conducts the sprint retrospective meeting with the sole purpose of assessing the effectiveness of the sprint execution, identifying areas of improvement, and finalizing the adjustments for future sprints. This way, the Scrum team can continuously evaluate its processes and improve them for more effective outcomes.
All the above steps, from sprint planning to sprint retrospective, are repeated continuously throughout the project until its completion. The number of sprints depends on the project's size and complexity. Overall, the Agile Scrum framework is a continuous loop of iterative and incremental development, feedback, and improvement.
Looking at the Agile Scrum structure, role, and responsibilities, it is evident that it offers a unique way of project management. So, it may raise the question of why it is so successful and getting global attention.
To understand the success of the Agile Scrum framework, the below key advantages of Scrum can clear it all:
All these top-notch benefits associated with the Agile Scrum framework are unavailable with other methodologies. Besides that, the fast-paced business era also demands the above benefits, that's why organizations are actively shifting towards Scrum Agile methodology.
The Agile Scrum framework has emerged as the best project management framework that ensures continuous incremental releases, collaborative teams, frequent feedback loops, and adaptability to changing requirements. However, understanding the core principles of Scrum are important to extract its full potential. That's why this article tried to cover all the basics about its structure, role, and responsibilities you should know about. To sum up, if you are looking to adopt Scrum in your organization, adhere to its principles, roles, and responsibilities to get the best outcomes.
