Overview

Artifacts Overview

Scrum artifacts represent work or value

Provide transparency and foster communications

Access should be universal for the entire team

Artifacts Overview

Artifacts have commitments:

    Product Backlog → Product Goal

    Sprint Backlog → Sprint Goal

    Increment → Definition of Done

Product Backlog

Definition

Ordered list of what is needed to create/improve the product

Single source of the work undertaken

Responsibility of the product owner

Feedback from the team is crucial

Periodically refined

User Stories

Backlog items should be written as user stories

Non-technical description of a feature

Represent functionality that will be valued by the users

Template:

“As a [persona], I [want to], [so that].”

User Stories

“As an instructor, I want to deliver be best imaginable classes, so that all my students will succeed.”

“As a sales manager, I want to see a real-time dashboard of sales performance, so that I can make data-driven decisions.”

User Stories

User stories should be kept small

They should always be completed within a sprint

Somestimes, large user stories are referred to as epics. Epics can be split into smaller user stories

No need to to cover every little detail

User Stories

“As a marketing analyst, I want to analyze the effectiveness of marketing campaigns using objective metrics, so that I can optimize future campaigns for better results.”

“As a customer retention specialist, I want to predict which customers are at risk of churning, so that I can implement targeted retention strategies”

Product Goal

Overview

Sets a target for the Scrum Team to plan against

It is a long-term objective

Part of the Product Backlog

The Product Backlog provides the means to achieve the Product Goal

Overview

Product Goals should be:

Specific: Have a clear defined scope

Measurable: A metric for evaluate its success

Time-bound: A deadline or set of deadlines

Examples

“We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade... ” JFK

“Lose/Gain 10 pounds of fat/muscle before next Summer.”

Examples

Develop and deploy a sales forecasting model within the next 3 months that predicts sales for the next quarter with at least 90% accuracy.

Build a web traffic analytics tool within 2 months that provides detailed insights into user behavior on the website using key metrics like bounce rate, session duration, and conversion rates for different traffic sources.

Sprint Backlog

Overview

Plan by and for the Developers

Snapshot of the work to be done in the Sprint

Updated and tracked throughout the Sprint

Elements

Composed of:

Sprint Goal → why

Selected Product Backlog items* → what

Actionable plan → how

Elements

Should have enough detail so that progress can be tracked on Daily Scrums

Items not finished might leak to future sprints...

...or get discarded

Acceptance Criteria

User stories are typically defined with acceptance criteria

Define measurable requirements that must be met for a user story to be considered complete

Each criteria should be written in a way that allows for validation

Serve as a shared agreement between the Product Owner, Developers, and Stakeholders

Sprint Goal

Overview

Single objective for the Sprint

Helps to focus efforts

Created during the Sprint Planning

Examples

Clean and preprocess the sales data from the last 6 months.

Develop a prototype for the customer churn prediction model.

Increment

Overview

Stepping stone towards the Product Goal

Sum of all the Product Backlog items completed during the current Sprint and all previous Sprints*

Multiple Increments may be created within a Sprint

Only counts what meets the Definition of Done

Increment

Definition of Done

Overview

Criteria that must be met for a user story to be considered done

Agreed upon by the team and prominently displayed

Serves as a guide and frequently include testing

Example

Met the acceptance criteria

Merged into the shared repository

Peer Reviewed

Tested on all intended platforms

Required documentation was completed

Deployed to production

Working Agreement*

Problems that can arise

TMs ghosting others for several days

TMs delivering at the very last minute

TMs "breaking" other TMs code

Less than cordial communications

Working Agreement

Set of guidelines created by the Team for the Team

Delineates expectations

Should be small, updated as needed, and establish consequences

Working Agreement

Things to include:

  → Preferred form of contact and overall availability

  → Meeting schedules

  → Scripting practices to be adopted

  → How to update datasets and scripts repository

  → What to do when a member misses a meeting