Throughput

5 minutes 5 Questions

Throughput is the number of User Stories completed per sprint and helps to measure the team’s productivity. It's calculated by counting the number of User Stories moved to done status within a sprint. Tracking throughput helps the team to understand their productivity levels across different time periods. Together with Cycle Time, it is a key driver for optimizing a team’s flow to deliver more value quickly, predictably, and sustainably.

Understanding Throughput in Scrum: A Guide to Answering Exam Questions

Throughput in Scrum is a key metric that measures the average rate at which work items are completed during a specific period. It is expressed in terms of items per unit of time, typically Stories per Sprint, helping teams to understand how much work they can accomplish within a specific time frame.

Why is Throughput important? It helps show if a team's productivity is improving, stable, or declining, assisting in predicting future performance. A stable or increasing throughput indicates a successful system, while a decreasing throughput might signal inefficiencies.

How does it work? To calculate throughput, one needs to divide the total number of work items completed by the total time taken.

Exam Tips: Answering Questions on Throughput
For exam questions related to throughput, it is important to:
- Understand how throughput is calculated and what it measures.
- Know how to interpret the results and what they could mean for a team's productivity.
- Recognize that throughput can vary from team to team, project to project.
- Remember that a higher throughput doesn't necessarily mean better quality. It is just one metric and should be viewed in conjunction with other metrics to get a holistic understanding of a team's performance.
Keep in mind these points, and it will help you to better understand and answer questions regarding throughput in your exam.
Test mode:
Start practice test

PSM I - Throughput Example Questions

Test your knowledge of Throughput

Question 1

A Scrum team is working on legacy code and their throughput is taking a hit. As a Scrum Master, what is the best way to handle this situation?

Correct Answer: Analyze the impact of the legacy code on the team's velocity and collaborate with the team and Product Owner to prioritize technical debt in the product backlog.

The correct approach involves acknowledging the drag caused by the legacy code on the team's velocity and working towards a sustainable solution by prioritizing the technical debt in the backlog. This way, the team can systematically address the issue without compromising on the delivery of new features. The wrong answers, although related to development practices, either suggest creating sub-teams (which can dilute the focus and efforts of the team), altering sprint duration (which doesn't address the root problem and might lead to burnout), or enforce pair programming (which is beneficial but not a standalone solution to handling problems associated with legacy code).

Question 2

The Scrum team's throughput decreases every time they integrate their codebase with another team. This causes a delay in the delivery of product increments. What should be the Scrum Master's strategy in this scenario?

Correct Answer: Arrange a cross-team workshop to understand the challenges and identify a process to smoothen the integration with minimum disruption to throughput.

The correct answer focuses on collaboration and problem-solving within and across teams to address the integration issues causing a decrease in throughput. Advocating for new tools or allocating fixed time slots may seem like solutions but do not address the root cause of the problem or involve collaborative problem-solving. Reporting the issue to higher management for intervention sidelines the empowerment and self-organization principles of Scrum teams.

Question 3

The development team is switching to a new programming language, which has temporarily decreased throughput. What should Management do?

Correct Answer: Show patience for the team to become proficient in the new language, until then focus on smaller stories.

In an Agile context like Scrum, learning and adaptation are key values. Hence, 'Showing patience for the team to become proficient in the new language, and focusing on smaller stories in the meantime' is the best suggested action based on these principles. For the explanation of why the other answers are not suitable, the reasoning is as follows: For 'Forcing the team to work in the old programming language', it is counter to the spirit of continuous improvement and adaptation that is core to Agile and Scrum. The third option mentioned, 'Demanding faster output from the team' can result in rushed and potentially low quality work, which does not line up with the principles of Scrum. The final suggestion, 'Hiring new developers who are proficient in the new language and letting go of the current team' overlooks the value of the team's existing knowledge and domain expertise, and would likely also create a poor team culture, as Scrum emphasizes individuals and interactions over processes and tools.

More Throughput questions
33 questions (total)
Start 33 question test

Other Scrum Metrics concepts

Cumulative Flow DiagramCycle TimeEscaped DefectsLead TimeRelease Burn-up ChartSprint Burn-down ChartSprint Goal SuccessTeam VelocityVelocityWork In Progress (WIP)
All Scrum Metrics questions · PSM I practice test