What is Scrum

 The modern society Is very dynamic and changes following each other in more and more rapid pace. When we look at the IT industry it becomes apparent that the IT industry has some very distinctive differences, compared to other industries. People and ideas have to move fast, adapt and react quicker every time to remain competitive and relevant, in the environment where the markets moving at the speed of the Internet. These changes trickle down to the very fundamental activities of for example software development, where having maximum flexibility to accurately comply with the client’s or customers demands has become a must-have in every modern development company.

So now what about Scrum, Scrum is not only one of the greatest inventions in the agile world but also one of the most popular and (mis)used frameworks. There is however a but, with this popularity comes a great responsibility, which when abused, it will lead to controversies. 

Even Scrum itself has not been immune to controversy, and its history of invention is a topic of frequent debate. Some professionals believe that Jeff Sutherland, John Scumniotales, and Jeff McKenna invented Scrum in 1993. And then there are others who vouch for Hirotaka Takeuchi and Ikujiro Nonaka as inventing Scrum in 1986.

I myself believe that Hirotaka Takeuchi and Ikujiro Nonaka came up with the initial concepts of Scrum, including the word “Scrum” itself in their white paper, “The New Product Development Game.”

A number of years ago, Hirotaka Takeuchi and Ikujiro Nonaka were doing research on team dynamics. Their particular area of interest was in teams that did new product development. And they noticed something odd: some teams did new product development particularly well. Others were not as successful. But the puzzling thing is that success did not seem to be related to technical skill level, Team A had technically skilled members and so did Team B…but Team A did new product development well but Team B was not successful. They were asking themselves why that would be.

They conducted a study and found interesting patterns, which they described using sports analogies. The teams that were not successful with new product development used what they called a “relay race” approach. These teams had members with highly specialized skill sets and the work was done sequentially, with one person finishing their part, then formally handing off to the next person (think architects handing off to developers handing off to testers, etc) like a track relay team. These researches saw that, with new product development, that was way too rigid an approach. Developing new products, you sometimes needed to backtrack, retry, move laterally. They believed a more flexible, collaborative approach would be more successful.

Sure enough, the teams that did new product development well did use a collaborative approach. They tended to stay together throughout the life of a project, were very cross-functional and passed the work back and forth in a fluid fashion, doing whatever necessary to keep progressing.

Hirotaka Takeuchi and Ikujiro Nonaka observed that the way this teams approach reminded of a rugby team. Of course, if you don’t know anything about rugby, that analogy goes right over your head.

When Americans get introduced to rugby, they often say it reminds them of football (fair statement - American football was based, in part, on the game of rugby.) But where you really feel the difference in the sport is not so much when you watch rugby but when you play rugby. From a game-player perspective, the whole feel of the game is different and that is, in part, due to one rule: in rugby, there is no forward passing. The ball is passed many more times in a rugby match than it is in football, but a player must always pass to someone beside or behind them. Therefore, rugby teams move down the pitch (ie- the field) together, passing the ball from person to person in a fluid manner, doing whatever necessary to move down the pitch and score.

Hirotaka Takeuchi and Ikujiro Nonaka thought that was an great analogy for the behaviour they saw in the teams that were successful with new product development. The work of their project was just like a ball in a rugby match - they passed it back and forth in a fluid manner, doing whatever necessary to keep moving forward and bring their project to successful completion. As a result of these findings the term Scrum was born

Jeff Sutherland then applied these from the white paper and fine-tuned it. Schwaber and Sutherland collectively presented their experiences during the OOPSLA 1995 conference. Subsequently, Schwaber and Beedle attempted to communicate Scrum through the first known Scrum book Agile Software Development with Scrum.

As the Scrum community started growing, it was decided to create a platform to bring them together, which in turn lead to the birth of the Scrum Alliance (SA) and Certified ScrumMaster (CSM) certification. However, controversies started brewing about transparency and the motive behind SA, resulting in the birth of Scrum.org, currently everybody is offers scrum training and certifications and sets up Scrum communities.

Now we know all about Rugby and why Scrum is called Scrum. Now it is about time to find out why it is so important. Why does everybody want to use Scrum? Because you don’t want to waste your time and money building a product no one will want to use or pay for. It is not for nothing that the success percentage of an IT project is dramatically low. Large IT projects are notorious to fail spectacular. “I get a product, way too late, way too expensive, I cannot use anymore, due to the fact the business environment has changed and the product is not fit for purpose anymore”. This happened to me a number of times, the market we were operating in changed and the project was not able to change as with it.

Scrum has the power to transform project management across every industry, every business, and even across life in general. When you use Scrum, you’ll become more “Agile”, discovering how to react more quickly and respond more accurately to the inevitable change that comes your way. And by staying focused, collaborating, and communicating, you can accomplish what truly needs to be done. Successfully! In stead of do things right, do the right things.

Let’s break down the Scrum team and find out which roles are present and that are their main responsibilities. First The Scrum Master