What are the major benefits of scrum as a methodology? [closed]

Question

I work in the technical department of a design agency. We use XP to manage our department's software development. I have been asked to give a short presentation describing Scrum and whether it would be suitable, in a broader context, for managing client project work.

Scrum would be applied to cross functional teams containing graphic designers, information architects, content editors, user experience engineers, web designers and software developers.

What benefits could scrum bring to this sort of team?

Dillard

Answer 1

Based on my experience, I would say the key features of Scrum are:

• High visibility of progress.
• Regular feedback from customer.
• Predictable rhythm.
• Measurable productivity (via burndown, velocity, etc.).
• Cross-functional, self-organising teams.
• Inspect and adapt.
• Low bureaucratic overhead (meetings, documentation, etc.).
• Emphasis on face-to-face communication.

And these features lead to the following benefits:

• Project can respond easily to change.
• Problems are identified early.
• Customer gets most beneficial work first.
• Work done will better meet the customers needs.
• Improved productivity.
• Ability to maintain a predictable schedule for delivery.

Dillard

Answer 2

If we're talking about the benefits only they are pretty much obvious.

Using a proper methodology you work better, i.e. you have higher rate of successful projects. If your projects are already 100% successful you probably do not need to change anything.

For us using Agile helps to:

1. Increase the quality of the deliverables (because of the strict iteration rules, when you expect everything to be working by the end of the iteration instead of 'coding being complete' it works wonders)
2. Cope better with the changes (and expect the changes. It's mostly psychological issue but it really helps when your developers expect that a requirement will change at some point)
3. Provide better estimates and spend less time doing them

4. Be more in control of the project schedule and state (short iterations, clear, unambiguous ways of calculating the velocity etc.)

5. As a result we achieve higher customers satisfaction rate in general

Brokaw

What kind of downsides do you see? – Gomphosis

Answer 3

In my experience, the main benefit is that your manager gets to say you are doing Scrum, and you get to waste more time going to daily meetings instead of getting work done.

... it's possible they weren't doing it right ;-).

Mayemayeda

Answer 4

First of all Scrum is a methodology for project management not for development...it can be combined with XP or RUP...

Scrum is good for you if you have a project that changes...when your requierements changes you need to keep up with these changes... Scrum has short iterations (2-4 weeks) and this provides more response to the changes... and the client can have a early release of his product and you can have all that feedback you need... maybe this is the first benefit...

Another benefit: your team will be always working syncronized specially when they depend on each other...

Hewlett

well if we are gonna nitpick its not a methodology, its a framework – Injudicious

Answer 5

For the team you describe I see these main benefits:

Visibility into what's happening and accountability. During the SHORT daily meeting you get a better idea of what's happening, what was finished and what was not. After some time you start to see trends: who's good estimating, who is not, who is telling you they are working when they really are not. You have a better picture of when you are going to be done.

Self organization. The team members are the ones that pick what to do and when for the given iteration. This takes time when people are not used to it, but ends up making team members happier because nobody is dictating who gets to do what. They decide.

Improved ability to rapidly react to requirements changes. The concepts of time boxing , daily status checks and user involvement will make it easier to both capture feedback and change your priorities.

Choreography

Answer 6

I don't see much differences between XP and Scrum. If you already have XP, you likely don't need to switch. Maybe adopt some Scrum specific practices for better scalability like Scrum-of-Scrums. Almost all the other practices exist in XP like daily meetings, iterations, roles separation, retrospectives, etc.

In fact I am not sure that such separation have benefits. It is bette to decide what you are doing bad during retrospective meetings and apply practices from any process (or create own solutions) to your specific problems. XP and Scrum give you a framework that will help to be adaptive and creative. While traditional processes gives you a set of rules that impedance any creative behavior.

Your team and your project IS special. Think and communicate to sharpen your development process.

Mycology

Answer 7

As I understand it, daily Scrum meetings are for the team to discuss progress and blocking issues. The Scrum master facilitates. The product owner can be invited if the team decides to do so, but the meeting is not intended to provide any progress status to a boss or a manager.

I hope I am correct.

Kenlay

Answer 8

You won't get deadlines getting late :)

Eisk

Answer 9

When you say "Scrum" I don't know if you mean agile, or just the daily meeting. Assuming you just mean what is the advantage of the daily meeting I see 3

1 - You have an opportunity to expose any issues you are having to the entire team and can get help an advice from people you might not have thought to ask. It's more efficient that having to interrupt coworkers throughout the day to try to get help for some problems you're having.

2 - Group teams get a better picture of what the entire group is doing and you have an opportunity to influence development you're not immediately involved in.

3 - You generally get to spend less time writing progress reports because everyone, including your boss, hears everyday what you're working on and what progress you've made.

That's my experience with scrum

Derrick

Ah! Clearly you have not experienced the brilliant strategy of making people write their status reports before every daily meeting. – Mayemayeda

I mean scrum as a whole, not just the daily stand-up. – Dillard

Answer 10

I've been "Scruming" for two years and my experience tells me that it's much easier to know "where we are" at any point because the development process is in fixed length periods (Sprints) that allows to evaluate what's been done. And in the middle of those periods having the Daily Scrum (those meetings Dmitriy was talking about) and the Burndown Chart (the graphic of the remaining work) allows the team and the manager to always know what's already done and what's the team is working on.

In your case you'll probably need to have several smaller Scrums, instead of a large one, because Scrum works best with smaller teams. This book has some insights about that: http://www.infoq.com/minibooks/scrum-xp-from-the-trenches

Fishery

Answer 11

I think scrum is more of a habit than a method or practice. There are lot of teams operating in scrum without knowing that they are doing agile and there could be lot of teams claiming that they are agile and not following the basic principles of scrum.

Triquetrous

Answer 12

I have worked with kanban, waterfall, agile scrum and others while development software products and with my experience, I am more comfortable with scrum. It gives you sense of achievement and keep you awake in the light of what needs to be achieved further and how to do it.

Scrum product development methodology is based on incremental and iterative product development process where solutions grow due to collaboration between cross-functional and self-organizing teams. Here are the major benefits of scrum

• Simplicity and transparency of processes
• Adaptive planning
• Quick adaptability to change
• Evolutionary development and delivery model
• Iterative approach
• Quick learning cycles
• Automated testing offers a stable platform
• Rapid market release
• Integrated and flexible teams which can change requirements anytime based on user feedback

I feel I have made enough justice to the answer.

Here is where you can learn more on my experience: http://www.cygnet-infotech.com/blog/agile-scrum-methodology-for-product-engineering

Basham

Answer 13

Team Spirit High visibility of progress. Frequent demonstration and early feedback from stakeholders Problems are identified early Quality of product and Improved productivity Higher customer satisfaction

Kesha

That sounds like corporate marketing speak. I guess they got a sale with you. – Hathorn