Perhaps the most common question that people answer incorrectly on our PSM I practice assessment is the following:
A Scrum Team must be 10 or fewer people? True or False?
Scrum recognises that small teams are generally a good thing and will be essential for self-management to be effective. It acknowledges if a team is too small it may struggle to be cross-functional. If it is too large then communication will become increasingly difficult. Scrum makes a recommendation of Scrum Teams being 10 people or less. However, Scrum does not go as far as to mandate the size of a Scrum Team. Here is the relevant section from The Scrum Guide:
“The Scrum Team is small enough to remain nimble and large enough to complete significant work within a Sprint, typically 10 or fewer people. In general, we have found that smaller teams communicate better and are more productive. If Scrum Teams become too large, they should consider reorganizing into multiple cohesive Scrum Teams, each focused on the same product.”
So this guidance on Scrum Team size is a recommendation, not a rule.
Please note: In the Scrum Guide prior to 2020 the commentary on team size related to the Development Team and it was recommended that between 3 and 9 was the optimum Development Team size. The Scrum Guide update in 2020 changed this as detailed above.
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To your knowledge, has this question been asked in a PSM1 exam and does Scrum.org agree that the answer is False?
Hi Marite,
Very similar questions have appeared in the Scrum.org assessment. I have been working with Scrum.org for 8 years so am certain about this despite it being a common misconception. It does, of course, depend on the wording used in the question.
Team size is recommended, but not mandated by Scrum.
Regards
Simon