“Did you know, around 60% of companies experience a huge increase in profits after effectively adopting an Agile approach?”
Agile adoption is not optional anymore. Today, it has become mainstream by the majority of companies. Because it gives you the ability to develop software rapidly and affordably which leads to an uplift in productivity.
In this article, we’ll walk you through the terms and concepts used in Agile Scrum Methodology.
What is Agile Scrum Methodology?
Agile Scrum Methodology is referred to as a project management system, that works on developing software products piece-by-piece. The repetitions are split into well-managed time slabs, each of which takes four-week Sprints. Every sprint provides important features that effectively build a full product. In subsequent sprints, enhancements and additional features based on team and customer feedback are developed into the product.
We know your next question: how agile is different from scrum? Keep reading.
Difference Between Agile and Scrum
The common difference between Scrum and Agile: Agile is a method of project management that utilizes a fundamental set of benefits or policies; Scrum is a particular agile technique utilized based on the project.
The comprehensive comparison of Agile software development practice and the scrum framework can provide you with a complete understanding.
1. Agile
Agile is termed a software development process. It involves a cross-functional and proficient team that works to keep improving the delivery experience through consistent feedback shared during the sprints.
Agile procedures thus become an integral part of each delivery to make the process better.
2. Agile Manifesto
Agile is considered a code of principles. Agile methodology balances the planning and processes. When combined, this manifesto backed up managing software development.
Agile enables teams to work perfectly and lay emphasis on building up complex software projects. It involves methods that are simply accepted and utilize iteration-based methods that result in desired outcomes.
3. Agile Methodologies
Several Agile methodologies are widely utilized in many diversified industries. These involve Scrum, Crystal, Lean, TDD, and so on.
However, the most popular one is Scrum.
4. Scrum
Scrum is an excellent framework that makes the implementation of Agile easy.
It is the highly popular Agile methodology across the competitive software industry today. Being a lightweight methodology commonly used in software development caters to small sprints that are time-bound and meant for additional features to be carefully integrated into the product.
Scrum is managed by development teams with three well-defined roles specifically in the IT business such as Product Owner (PO), Scrum Master (SM), and Development Team.
Scrum has a series of roles, meetings, and project management tools to assist self-organized teams in better design as well as managing their tasks.
What Are Scrum Values?
The Scrum framework was developed based on the empiricism theory. This theory states that knowledge comes from shared experiences and decision-making procedures on the basis of pre-existing knowledge of what is already known.
That is the reason the scrum technique uses iterations with good increments to make sure that every future risk can be controlled and it easily optimizes future predictions. The key three pillars of empiricism that the Scrum technique supports, are listed below.
1. Transparency
This is really significant for every stakeholder. There are some crucial aspects of the development method that want to be visible to the team so that there is some outcome. Such aspects have to be really well-defined so everyone can better comprehend and interpret every piece of information.
2. Inspection
Every artifact utilized in each sprint is required to be completely examined by the professional Scrum team. This inspection assists in finding any unwanted or disruptions variances in the process. It has to be done more often but in a better way that doesn’t disturb the sprint.
3. Adaptation
If there are any problems found at the time of inspection, they have to be fixed. This is so that the final product is acceptable to the consumers. It can be easily solved by adapting or doing some adjustments to the processes so that future deviations are easily minimized.
4. Scrum Roles
Again, a Scrum team has three important roles: Development Team, Scrum Master, and Product Owner.
5. Product Owner
The person who is working in this role is the overall maintainer of the product. A Scrum team basically has a single PO, who is responsible for handling business needs, requirements, and customer expectations. It determines as well as finalizes features, established the roadmap, and prioritizes tasks and backlogs.
6. Scrum Master
This role player works as a facilitator for Scrum in his team. As an intermediary, he/she provides proper guidelines to the product owner and team and brings the best practices. Essentially, Scrum Master carefully optimizes the distribution stream’s transparency. It established suitable resources for sprint planning, retrospectives,s and reviews.
7. Development Team
It’s a small group of cross-functional experts. This is an effective mixed team. The team has approximately 10 or more members. They work in a better way as work assigned by PO. Also, the developers and the development team have UX experts, designers, analysts, and testers.
What Is a Scrum Master?
Although, we have already mentioned the Scrum Master, here are a few more details on this role that may help you know the significance of this role. The Scrum Master holds the responsibility to ensure that the processes and operations in the project are running in an Agile way. Also, he is responsible to ensure every process is going on smoothly. Here are a few more tasks that he does:
- Eliminating the issues that are faced by the Scrum Team
- Developing an effective environment for the team
- Addressing the responsibilities of team members and managing the team dynamics
- Ensuring that there is a healthy balance between the product owner and team and also, every other stakeholder involved in the project
- Developing an environment for the team to work with no external disruptions
What Is the Scrum Lifecycle?
Now it’s time to talk about the Scrum lifestyle which is really important to know.
It can be defined as the stages that happen at the time of the project lifecycle. Sprints or repetitions are the key aspects of the Scrum lifestyle. Every scrum project is conducted with various sprints until the end product is ready. Every sprint is then divided into several stages to make sure successful and timely completion. This leads to top-notch product quality as well as timely delivery.
What Is a Scrum Sprint?
A Scrum sprint is a repetition that is an aspect of the consistent development cycle for any provided Scrum project. Approximately, a sprint can remain for around 2 to 4 where some amount of work has to be done by the Scrum team. With every sprint, the majority of the work of the project gets perfectly completed as well as reviewed. Every key project aspect is split into many, constant intervals to plan, modify, develop, deliver, and review the product till the time it reaches the end phase of completion.
Related Article: How We Run As Client’s Extended Distributed Teams Using Agile Techniques
What Are the Scrum Ceremonies?
Every sprint is formed out of four phases called Scrum ceremonies so that it is effectively getting executed. The ceremonies are mentioned below:
1. Sprint Planning
Sprint planning develops an environment for an effective sprint for the complete team. Every team member participates prior to starting any sprint to discuss every product backlog item with each other and finalize the timelines and timelines to properly complete the sprint.
After this, there is a sprint estimate made to develop a sprint backlog to get it done within the given duration. This is a sprint’s backbone.
2. Daily Scrum
The daily scrum happens every sprint to ensure every team member gets an update on their progress. It develops accountability and transparency within the team. It is a small meeting that happened at a particular time of the day where some questions are addressed. It’s not a comprehensive meeting, which implies it doesn’t last for over 10-15 minutes. Team members do the discussion of what has been done, what they will do in the day, and if there are some problems faced.
3. Sprint Review
There is a review performed after every sprint gets finished by the complete Scrum team. In this, the team can easily showcase what they have performed and review the product developments they have specifically worked on in the sprint.
It develops a platform for feedback for the many team members so that they can boost their methods in another sprint. It is a full review of the work done in the sprint so this amazing Scrum ceremony is not limited to any time-bound process.
4. Sprint Retrospective
The comprehensive ceremony happens after the review and hardly lasts longer than a single hour. The Scrum team come together to debate the feedback given in the review to provide ways to apply it in future sprints. It assists with the consistent improvement of processes in the Scrum team, which is a quite crucial aspect of Agile.
5. Scrum Artifacts
The Scrum Artifacts are important parts of the Agile Scrum Methodology to assist with the product development process. They provide the Scrum team with every vital information important to developing an effective sprint. The artifacts have Sprint Backlog, Product Backlog, and Increment.
6. Product Backlog
A product backlog is importantly a list of needs in a product. It is formed by combining all the functions, features, enhancements, and fixes that are crucial for a product life cycle. As per a recent survey, 70% of the PBIs take almost less than 3 weeks to go through the complete workflow of every product backlog. This is updated more often based on the transformation in requirements.
7. Sprint Backlog
The PBIs are split into sprints, developing the Sprint Backlog, which is basically the items listed in a product backlog that has to be done within a sprint. A sprint backlog also involves a plan to provide product increments and how the team can accomplish the Sprint Goal. It states the development of teamwork that is important to meet the goal of the sprint.
8. Increment
Last but not least., the increment is the final artifact which is almost the total of completed product backlog items lying within the sprint duration as well as the sprints before. After every sprint, the increment has to be marked as “Done,” which is an approved usable condition for the end product, whether or not get it is launched.
These are all the most widely used terms that are widely used in the Agile Scrum Methodology. Now, it’s time to introduce you to its benefits in diverse sectors.
Agile Scrum Methodology Benefits
There are several benefits of the Agile Scrum Methodology. Firstly, it secures product development. Every goal is preserved in the sprint iterations. There is a need for regular planning as well as goal setting in the pre-requisite efforts that assist the Scrum team focus more on existing Sprint goals and increasing productivity.
- Consistent feedback from stakeholders over sprints offer the chance for adjusting and making the product features better.
- Agile helps developers and product managers keep reviewing as well as retooling existing plans on the basis of new information that the team keeps collecting and analyzing.
- Frequent analysis and review in Agile methodology provide opportunities to developers and product managers for improvements.
Also, Agile Scrum Methodology strengthens business functioning as below:
- Agile assists in tackling expensive features with a properly planned timeline, thereby cutting down overall costs.
- The vigilance provided by the team in testing as well as evaluation boosts the product quality.
- Help teams to remain well organized and work together on a similar page, with a usual sprint goal.
- With increments visibility, consumers get satisfactory deliverables.
Related Article: How to Hire an Agile Software Development Team From iTechnolabs
Are you Still Confused between Scrum Development or Agile Scrum Methodology?
At last, we can say that agile has a proven track record of finishing projects on time without increasing budgets. Planning, building, design, testing, and delivery are the most common software development phases. But when it comes to the agile approach, it aims to launch the first increment in a couple of weeks and the entire piece of software in a couple of months.
Scrum outperforms alternate agile development methods in certain ways. Now, it is the most commonly used as well as widely recognized reference framework in the booming software industry.
So, what are your views about the Agile Scrum Methodology?
