On Scrum and Estimations

I have seen many Scrum novices arguing and saying that Estimates are not useful as we are anyways putting in our focus and energy on the most important tasks.

That’s seldom true. Estimates are important and provide a rough idea about how future should shape itself.

Read this insightful post on Estimation in a Scrum Project  from Mike Cohn. It shows a dialogue between client and the Scrum team.

It is important to note that Scrum projects are part of real world that requires some idea about what will be delivered. Any Scrum team cannot take the flexibility that the framework provides for granted.

The flexibility is to eliminate the unnatural, rule-powered ways from the project. It’s not to disregard the need of business.

Here’s my take on it:

“If it doesn’t make a business sense, it is not the right implementation of Scrum.”

 

 

Scrum and Control

Scrum and Control…What?

Scrum is all about NOT being in conventional control and still getting things done, fast and more effectively.

Today, Blogger, Author and a friend, Tanmay Vora wrote an interesting post that conveys a similar point – How NOT to be in control.

Tanmay talks about three important points:

  1. Positional Power.
  2. Staying on top of the information and
  3. Communication.

All the three points are nicely conveyed.  Read Tanmay’s full post here.

An effective implementation of Scrum also touches upon all three points that Tanmay mentioned.

In Scrum, there is no positional power. People who get things done are in control of their own work and the software is developed collaboratively with the loosely defined guidelines that are based on tightly subscribed principles.

Staying on top of the information is the key success driver for a Scrum team. In Daily Scrum Meetings, this becomes evident.

Take any successful Scrum project and you will find a common thing – excellent communication among the team members. No communication, no Scrum. It is covered in the basics. Individuals and interactions over processes and tools.

Many a times, people ask me: Why is Scrum your favorite weapon in the world of software development? My answer is simple – It is the most logical, getting it done kinda framework that doesn’t depend on mere rules and controllers of those rules.

Scrum relies on principles more than rules…and I have always chosen principles over rules and have never regretted.

Scrum rocks. People doing right kind of Scrum also.

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