The Foundations for Scaling
The key to using Scrum at scale is ensuring that you are using Scrum effectively before attempting to scale. Ensure firm foundations are in place with which you can scale effectively. Before you start to scale, Ask yourself – Are we ready? If the answer is no, consider ways to improve your practices first and become more effective.
To do this, you should start by improving your teams, so they adopt Scrum practices rather than just following the rules of mechanical Scrum. Many teams using Scrum in the real world have the roles, artifacts and events in place that the Scrum Guide mandates, but they fail to see the significant benefits that can come with Scrum. This is often described as the difference between “doing Agile” and “being Agile”.
An effective Scrum Team will be collaborative and high-performing. They will plan their work and self-manage to deliver a potentially releasable Increment by the end of every Sprint. They will work together to solve and overcome issues. They will care and look out for one another. They will communicate frequently and effectively. Most importantly, they will use the practice of Empiricism that underpins Scrum to inspect and adapt their work regularly and continuously improve how they do things.
The Developers will have a close and collaborative relationship with their Product Owner. They will have effective technical practices and engineering standards in place and improve them frequently. They will ensure quality work is delivered and maintained by adhering to a Definition of Done. They will self-manage, plan and coordinate their work. They will be motivated and focused. They will be cross-functional and suitably skilled so they can autonomously create a potentially releasable Increment every Sprint.
An effective Scrum Team will have a Product Owner who works collaboratively with the Developers. This Product Owner will have a clear and strong vision for the Product and will communicate what is required effectively via a well-refined, ordered transparent and clear Product Backlog. The Product Owner will ensure that the items at the top of the Product Backlog are high value and will work with the Developers to ensure these items are delivered effectively.
An effective Scrum Team will have a Scrum Master who acts as a leader and a servant to coach the Scrum team to improve what they build, how they build it, and to help solve any challenges they face. The Scrum Master will ensure that the mechanics of Scrum are in place and will go on to enable the Scrum team to become collaborative, self-managing and productive.