Agile Frameworks

Agile is an umbrella term for a vast variety of frameworks and techniques, sharing the principles and values described above. Each of them has its own areas of use and distinctive features. The most popular frameworks are Scrum, Kanban, Hybrid, Lean, Bimodal, and XP. Before discussing these frameworks in more detail, let’s look at their key features

Scrum: Roles, Sprints, and Artifacts

Scrum is a dominant agile framework. It’s used exclusively by 58 percent of organizations while another 18 percent of the companies combine it with other techniques. First described in 1986 by Hirotaka Takeuchi and Ikujiro Nonaka in the New Product Development Game, it was formulated almost a decade after.In 1995, Ken Schwaber and Jeff Sutherland, the authors of The Scrum Guide, presented it at the OOPSLA conference. The presentation was based on the knowledge they acquired as they applied the method during the previous few years. While, Scrum was introduced far before the Agile Manifesto, it relies on Agile principles and is consistent with the values stated in that document

Scrum is aimed at sustaining strong collaboration between people working on complex products, and details are being changed or added. It is based upon the systematic interactions between the three major roles: Scrum Master, Product Owner, and the Team

• Scrum Master is a central figure within a project. His principal responsibility is to eliminate all the obstacles that might prevent the team from working efficiently.

• Product Owner, usually a customer or other stakeholder, is actively involved throughout the project, conveying the global vision of the product and providing timely feedback on the job done after every Sprint.

• Scrum Team is a cross-functional and self-organizing group of people that is responsible for the product implementation. It should consist of up to seven team members, in order to stay flexible and productive

 

Sprints and artifacts

A basic unit of work in scrum – Sprint – is a short development cycle that is needed to produce a shippable product increment. A Sprint usually is between one and four weeks long: More lengthy iterations lack the predictability and flexibility that are Scrum’s fundamental benefits. Having no standard duration (as long as it is less than four weeks), all the sprints within a project should have a fixed length. This makes it easier to plan and track progress

Scrum relies on three main artifacts which are used to manage the requirements and track progress – the Product Backlog, the Sprint Backlog, the Sprint Burndown Chart. The process is formalized through a number of recurring meetings, like the Daily Scrum (Standup), the Sprint Planning, the Review and Retrospective meetings

The Product Backlog is an ordered list of feature items that might be needed in the project’s final product. It is a single source of requirements. The product Backlog updates as new requirements, fixes, features, and details are being changed or added.

The Sprint Backlog is a list of tasks the team must complete to deliver an increment of functional software at the end of each Sprint. In other words, team members agree on which product items to deliver and define a plan on how to do so.

The Sprint Burndown Chart is an illustration of the work remaining in a Sprint. It helps both the team and the Scrum Master as it shows progress on a day-to-day basis and can predict whether the Sprint goal will be achieved on schedule.

Scrum meetings The process is formalized through a number of recurring meetings, like the Daily Scrum (Standup), the Sprint Planning, the Review, and Retrospective meetings (the Sprint Retrospective)

The Daily Scrum is a timeboxed meeting, during which a Development Team coordinates its work and sets a plan for the next 24 hours. The event lasts 15 minutes and should be held daily at the same place and time.

The work to be completed is planned at the Sprint Planning. Everyone involved in the Sprint (a Product Owner, a Scrum Master, and a Development Team) participates in this event. They answer two key questions: which work can be done and how this work will be done. The Sprint Planning lasts no longer than eight hours for a one-month Sprint. For shorter Sprints, the meeting usually takes less time.The work to be completed is planned at the Sprint Planning. Everyone involved in the Sprint (a Product Owner, a Scrum Master, and a Development Team) participates in this event. They answer two key questions: which work can be done and how this work will be done. The Sprint Planning lasts no longer than eight hours for a one-month Sprint. For shorter Sprints, the meeting usually takes less time

At the end of each Sprint, the team and the product owner meet at the Sprint Review. During this informal meeting, the team shows the work completed and answers questions about the product increment. All participants collaborate on what to do next to increase the product’s value. The Sprint Review is a four-hour timeboxed meeting for one-month Sprints.The whole team goes to Retrospective Meetings to reflect on their work during the Sprint. Participants discuss what went well or wrong, find ways to improve, and plan how to implement these positive changes. The Sprint Retrospective is held after the Review and before the next Sprint Planning. The event’s duration is three hours for one-month Sprints.

When to use Scrum

Scrum works well for long-term, complex projects that require stakeholder feedback, which may greatly affect project requirements. So, when the exact amount of work can’t be estimated, and the release date is not fixed, Scrum may be the best choice. By setting customer needs and on-time/on budget delivery as the highest priority, Scrum has gained the trust of 89 percent of Agile users. Thus, the list of companies using this approach is impressive. In fact, there is a public spreadsheet with such organizations, including Microsoft, IBM, Yahoo, and Google. The latest research by the Scrum Alliance suggests that Scrum goes beyond IT. Companies working in the fields of finance, consulting, and entertainment choose this approach to organize their work processes and enhance cooperation with customers. In 2016, the majority of State of Scrum Report respondents (98 percent) said they are going to use this framework to move forward.

Kanban: Comprehensive Solution to Handling Work in

Another common project management framework is Kanban. Forty three percent of companies have stated that they use Kanban as one of the project management frameworks. Originating from a visual system of cards used in Toyota manufacturing as a production control method, Kanban is simple, yet powerful, approach to developing software products. Translated as visual signal from Japanese,Kanban focuses on the visualization of the workflow and prioritizes the work in progress (WIP), limiting its scope to match it effectively to the team’s capacity. As soon as a task is completed, the team can take the next item from the pipeline. Thus, the development process offers more flexibility in planning, faster turnaround, clear objectives, and transparency.

 No standard procedures within the process, as well as the fixed iterations, are required in Kanban, as opposed to Scrum. The project development is based on the workflow visualization through a Kanban board, usually represented by sticky notes and whiteboards, or online tools like Trello.

 

Trello automates and digitalizes Kanban. Due to the succinct information about a work item each Kanban card contains, everyone in the team knows who is responsible for the item, what each person’s task is, when it’s supposed to be finished, etc. Team members can also leave comments, attach screenshots, documents, or links to providemore details. Teams using Kanban tools work in a cooperative manner. The ability to track progress helps coworkers understand everyone’s personal input in achieving the common goal, resulting in a focus on completing the task well and on time.

When to use Kanban (Production support)

Using Kanban, teams can do small releases and adapt to changing priorities. Unlike Scrum, there are no sprints with their predefined goals. Kanban is focused on doing small pieces of work as they come up. For example, if testers find errors in the product, developers try to fix them right away. Kanban, for instance, works well after the main release of the product. Companies like Spotify and Wooga (leading mobile games development company) have been using this approach successfully over the years. Yet, 8 percent of organizations combine Scrum with Kanban techniques, using so-called Scrumban rather than the original frameworks