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Scrum

Scrum is a simple framework that helps you and your team build complex products together.

Scrum is based on learning through experience, which means you don’t have to have all the answers at the start of the process. In fact, it acknowledges that the team doesn’t know everything, and that you’ll adapt as project requirements change.

Scrum is designed to help you respond quickly and efficiently to changing conditions, with short release cycles so you can continuously improve your product along the way.

Scrum is based on four key principles:

  • Creating cross-functional teams
  • Establishing a regular rhythm (i.e., sprints)
  • Delivering working software at the end of each sprint
  • Having team members work together to inspect and adapt their process

The Scrum GuideTM was developed to help people, teams and organisations generate value through adaptive solutions for complex problems.

The Origins of Scrum

The origin of Scrum can be traced back to 1986, in a Harvard Business Review article titled “The New New Product Development Game”. This article was written by Hirotaka Takeuchi and Ikujiro Nonaka using examples from Honda, Canon and Fuji-Xerox, who all described how they used different principles when developing a product than their competitors. These companies viewed their new processes as ways to develop new products quickly and flexibly without the constraints of an outdated and rigid organisation.

Takeuchi and Nonaka used sports as metaphors to describe how these companies worked together as a team towards their goal. They highlighted a new holistic rugby approach, where the whole team moves as one, working together towards one goal around any impediments.

Scrum is a software development process that’s been around since 1993. It was first implemented at the Easel Corporation by Jeff Sutherland, John Scumniotales and Jeff McKenna.

In 1995, Jeff Sutherland and Ken Schwaber jointly presented a paper, ”The SCRUM Development Process”, at Object-Oriented Programming, Systems, Languages & Applications (OOPSLA) Conference ‘95 in Austin, Texas.

In 2001, seventeen software developers (including Sutherland & Schwaber) got together in Snowbird, Utah to talk about the future of software development. The result was The Agile Manifesto. Their meeting became a call to action for developers around the globe to pursue a radically different way of developing software.

Since then, an expanding community of practitioners have started not only implementing Scrum framework, but producing high-performing teams in organisations all around the world.

Scrum Teams

A Scrum Team is a complex problem-solving unit comprised of three roles.

  1. Scrum Master
  2. Product Owner
  3. Developers

A few people – often fewer than 10 in total.

They are brought together to solve complex problems and produce products and services that delight customers.

What makes the unit so unique is that often they won’t know the answer or solution upfront.

Each member of the unit brings all their passion, expertise and creativity to the table. By working collaboratively, they discover new ways to help the customer. From creating something that’s never been created before to solving complex problems, they work hard to come up with a solution that brings value.

Learn more…

Can’t find what you’re looking for? Check out our frequently asked questions or our roles pages for more on Scrum.

How can we help?

Do you need help with applying the Scrum framework in your organisation?

Book a call to see how we can help you or

check out our Introduction to Agile & Scrum course to help refresh your knowledge.

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INTRO TO AGILE & SCRUM