Which Scrum Software Will Assure Guaranteed Project Success?

More often than not, I hear this quesiton – Which Scrum Software Will Assure Guaranteed Project Success?

My short answer is: “No Scrum Software can assure guaranteed project success.”

It is said time and again that no agile methodology or tools are silver bullets.

In order to succeed, teams have to work right (harder and smarter and whatever makes it right) by focusing on what’s important and eliminating everything else.

Agile manifesto also values Individuals and interactions more over processes and tools.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying methodologies are not useful. Indeed, they are but the Project Success depends on people doing right kind of things. Foundational principles matter more than methodology as any given methodology is just an implementation of set of principle it has subscribed in.

And depending upon the context, there are multiple right ways to implement the set of principles, isn’t it?

To get deeper in this subject, read this fantastic article called methodology doesn’t matter by Jesse Fewell from whom I learned Scrum.

So, coming back to the question, no software will assure guaranteed project success but a right team with whichever Scrum software they select is most likely to make the project successful.

You know why?

The right team will ask the right questions including the unpleasant ones and introspect how they are doing. It will make required corrections, Change or remove any of the tools they have been using but are no longer effective and deliver the value.

Remember, Scrum never succeeds or fails, people implementing Scrum may.

 

Creating Backlog Vs. Accomplishing a Backlog Item

When you don’t know what features to have  in your software product, that’s when organizations judge how powerful you’re as a Product Owner.

When you don’t have the statistics to back your idea up, it’s when you exhibit your organization how valuable your idea is.

And when you don’t know whether your idea is going to add value, that’s how organizations find whether or not you’ll continue to work as a Product Owner.

Creating Backlogs is much harder than accomplishing a backlog item, although both the activities count.

And that’s where Great Product Owners distinguish themselves.

So the question is: what would you do so that you’re distinguished as a Product Owner?