Scrum Team

5 minutes 5 Questions

The Scrum Team comprises of the Product Owner, the Scrum Master, and the Development Team. These individuals work together to deliver valuable, high-quality increments. The Scrum Team is self-organizing, meaning it determines the best way to accomplish the sprint goal, and remains cross-functional …

Guide for Scrum Team

Importance:
A scrum team is crucial as it is self-organizing, cross-functional and responsible for delivering a potentially shippable product increment at the end of each sprint. The effectiveness of the scrum methodology largely depends on the performance of the scrum team.

What it is:
A scrum team is made up of a Product Owner, Scrum Master, and Development Team. These roles bring together people with a wide range of skills and experiences to effectively manage and carry out the work.

How it works:
The Product Owner defines the product in terms of customer-centric items (User Stories). The Development Team transforms these items into an increment of potentially releasable functionality. The Scrum Master manages the process, facilitating the team and organization on the use of scrum.

Exam Tips:
When answering questions on the Scrum Team, ensure to highlight the key roles and how they work together. It helps to remember that the team is self-organizing, meaning there is no overall 'team leader'. Instead, the team collectively decides how to best accomplish their work. Use specific examples, where possible, to illustrate how problems might be solved within a scrum team. Remember, communication and collaboration are key aspects of a Scrum team, so ensure any answers reflect this.

Answering Questions on Scrum Team:
Read the questions carefully and use your understanding of the Scrum Team dynamics, the specific roles, and how they interact to come up with the best answers.

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PSM I - Scrum Team Example Questions

Test your knowledge of Scrum Team

Question 1

During the Sprint Retrospective, the team mentions that they feel overwhelmed by the number of tasks. As a ScrumMaster, what is the best course of action in this situation?

Propose the idea of increasing the sprint duration to accommodate more tasks without overwhelming the team. Encourage the team to assess their Definition of Done to ensure it's realistic and not contributing to the workload. Advise the team to adopt a more rigorous daily Scrum meeting to ensure every task is accounted for and efficiently distributed, potentially extending the length of the meetings to allow for deeper discussion on workload management and task distribution strategies. Suggest the Product Owner to prioritize the backlog items without consulting the team, to make the sprint more manageable.

Correct Answer: Encourage the team to assess their Definition of Done to ensure it's realistic and not contributing to the workload.

The correct course of action involves probing the underlying factors that could contribute to the team feeling overwhelmed, such as unrealistic expectations set by the Definition of Done. Unilaterally prioritizing backlog items without team input could lead to disengagement and doesn't address the root cause. Increasing the sprint duration might offer a temporary fix but does not solve the fundamental problem of workload management. Encouraging longer daily Scrum meetings overlooks the purpose of this ceremony, which is meant to be concise and focused, and may add to the feeling of being overwhelmed rather than alleviating it.

Question 2

The Scrum Team is struggling with coming to consensus on story points during planning poker. As a Scrum Master, what is the best way to facilitate this?

Ignore the issue and keep proceeding with the current way of voting. Encourage further discussion to ensure everyone understands the requirements of the backlog item, then conduct another round of voting. Make the decision on behalf of the team. Advise the team to drop planning poker and allocate story points themselves.

Correct Answer: Encourage further discussion to ensure everyone understands the requirements of the backlog item, then conduct another round of voting.

The best way to facilitate consensus on story points during planning poker in a Scrum Team is to 'Encourage further discussion to ensure everyone understands the requirements of the backlog item, then conduct another round of voting.' This encourages clear communication and understanding within the team about the requirements and scope of the work, which are fundamental to effective Agile practices. This then allows the team to reassess and agree on adequate story points reflecting the perceived complexity of the item. The other answers are less effective. 'Making the decision on behalf of the team' deprives the team of the benefits of collective decision making, and 'Ignoring the issue and proceeding with the current way of voting' does not resolve the problem. 'Advising the team to drop planning poker and allocate story points themselves' might lead to inconsistency in story point allocation as it takes away the structured approach to story point estimation provided by planning poker.

Question 3

The Scrum team consistently overestimates the complexity of user stories, leading to less productivity. As a ScrumMaster, what is the best approach to this scenario?

Implement a more granular breakdown of tasks and encourage pair estimating to improve accuracy. Suggest the team to stick with their current estimation process but add a buffer period to each sprint to accommodate any overestimated stories. Encourage the team to speed up their work by setting stricter deadlines for completing tasks, ensuring an increase in productivity. Advocate for a complete overhaul of the estimation process, suggesting the adoption of a different agile methodology that might not suffer from the same estimation challenges.

Correct Answer: Implement a more granular breakdown of tasks and encourage pair estimating to improve accuracy.

The correct approach involves addressing the root cause of the overestimation by improving the estimation process itself, such as breaking down tasks more granularly and using pair estimating. The wrong answers either do not directly address the overestimation issue, enforce arbitrary measures that could lead to decreased morale and burnout, or suggest drastic changes without evidence that they would solve the specific issue.

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