Have You Got a Chance to Read the 2020 Scrum Guide?; Here’s What’s New in It
The latest version of Scrum Guide was released in November 2020 by the Scrum founders, Ken Schwaber and Dr Jeff Sutherland, to celebrate the 25th anniversary of Scrum. You can watch the live event which featured the release of 2020 Scrum Guide to listen to the expert discussions on its changes and impacts. The authors say that this 13 pages guide is a straightforward, lighter, simpler, and shorter version to match Scrum to every domain and every department in every company.
Here are some new changes:
Scrum Team
No More Development Team — One Scrum Team; Three Accountabilities
Previously the Scrum Team consisted of 3 roles namely the Product Owner, the Development Team and the Scrum Master in which the Product Owner is one team, the others (SEs, QAs, BAs, designers) are a separate Development Team and the Scrum Master is floating around.
Now it is just one Scrum Team that consists of one Scrum Master, one Product Owner, and Developers who focus on the same objective with different accountabilities.
Changing the Development Team to Developers not only eliminates having a sub-team within the team but also makes it easier for other industries to understand the term developer.
Also, they do not mention the word ‘roles’ in the updated guide instead now there are accountabilities.
Self-Managing Scrum Team Over Self-Organizing Scrum Team
Previously the self-organizing Development Team chose how to accomplish their work (the how and who) and the Product Owner decides the what as per the prioritized Product Backlog.
Now the whole Scrum Team including the Product Owner is a self-managing team in which the team decides who does what, when and how.
Scrum Master is No Longer a Servant-Leader
Previously the Scrum Master was a servant-leader for the Scrum Team. Even though the servant-leadership concept was a key aspect of Scrum but it was not understood by many and there were Scrum Masters acting as team administrators without any leadership skill.
In the new guide, it states that the ‘Scrum Masters are true leaders who serve the Scrum Team and the larger organization’.
The Scrum Master is no longer just inquires about impediments to the Development Team’s progress, but instead, ensures the removal of impediments to the Scrum Team’s progress.
Scrum Events
Three Sprint Planning Topics
In addition to the previous Sprint Planning topics of what and how the new 2020 guide has another topic as the first topic — Why is this sprint valuable.
Daily Scrum Questions Not Mentioned
Previously a structure of three questions to be answered was suggested in the 2017 Scrum Guide but they no longer appear in the 2020 Guide.
Scrum Artifacts
Defined Commitments for Scrum Artifacts
The commitments are introduced for artifacts to enhance the transparency and a goal against which the progress can be measured.
- For the Product Backlog, it is the Product Goal
- For the Sprint Backlog, it is the Sprint Goal
- For the Increment, it is the Definition of Done
Product is explicitly defined
“A product is a vehicle to deliver value. It has a clear boundary, known stakeholders, well-defined users or customers. A product could be a service, a physical product, or something more abstract”
Product Goal
The 2020 Scrum guide introduces a new term — Product Goal. The authors first use this term in the very beginning of the guide when defining the Scrum Team stating ‘It is a cohesive unit of professionals focused on one objective at a time, the Product Goal’.
The Product Goal is the long-term objective of the Scrum Team which simply is the Product Backlog.
“Done” No Longer Quoted
The authors have stressed the importance of having a Definition of Done for the Scrum Team. Some points which were previously known implicitly are now explicitly mentioned as well — “If a Product Backlog item does not meet the Definition of Done, it cannot be released or even presented at the Sprint Review. Instead, it returns to the Product Backlog for future consideration.”
Happy Scrumming!
