Monday, 22 September 2014

Importance of Scrum Certification

We will attempt to do a quick overview of some of the Scrum certifications that are currently being offered.
Then, we will talk about figuring out the right trainer. It is beneficial to find a Scrum trainer with the background as yours however it is not an absolute requirement. The methodology and the style of the Scrum training can vary from trainer to trainer, so you should try to figure out which one suits your learning style.
The biggest positive of a formal Scrum training is that you learn everything in a controlled environment. You meet people who are also there to learn about Scrum and in case you have common background, it helps to understand the process and difficulties of implementation from outsider’s point of view. A formal training also helps you understand about the mistake which you may make due to the traditional project management concepts rooted in you.
The main purpose of any certification is to impart a common baseline of the knowledge. These Scrum certifications, compared to any other project management certifications have a very easy test. You should remember that getting a Scrum certificate is way easier than the implementing actual Scrum methodology.
Scrum/Agile methodology in general gives you a lot of freedom in how you implement it. However you should avoid changing the essence of the whole process. These project managers are commonly referred as Scrumbut. The common suggestion is that you start to implement Scrum as-is until you understand it properly and then decide for yourself what you might want to change. After a while you may find that you don’t need to change anything at all.
You need to understand that nothing is more valuable than experience. Scrum or Agile Certification may only add some credibility and marketability to the individual.


 To know more click on: http://www.scrumstudy.com/blog/

Thursday, 4 September 2014

Importance of Business Value – Is it enough for Scrum Backlog Prioritization?

Delivering maximum business value in a minimum time span is ingrained in the Scrum framework. Usually, Scrum projects are expected to create business or service value which makes Scrum framework attractive for business stakeholders.
But it is not clear if Business Value can be achieved by reducing costs involved, increasing the end revenue, enhancing customer delight, minimising risk or enhancing organizational capability. Business value and its assignment is a subjective task that requires balancing a lot of information based on lot of changing priorities. Product owner uses it as an indicator to prioritize the product backlog. Product backlog prioritization includes many other variables and attributes. Therefore, prioritization based on business value should not be the only approach. A good product owner should have strong understanding of the product’s vision and a good rapport with the customer and development team. Product owner should also take calculation of risk and effort into account while prioritizing backlogs. Product Owner should be able to forecast positive business value (gained after product is delivered) and negative business value (that can bring down the revenue figures) based on risk.
Companies in fact differ in their sales processes that determine what potential value of a product feature to launch in the market and the right time when to ship the product in the market. Stakeholders and senior management in a company decide on what to be shipped next to earn value. However, Stakeholders impose their individual wishes on the development teams or the Product Owners as their priorities do not match. A common agreement between the Stakeholders is achieved in respect to the fact, that the Product Owner should be the overall in charge of defining priorities.
Business Values are estimated in the same way the developers estimate the complexity. Estimation poker helps Product Owners and Stakeholders to get together, to share information related to Business Values and come up with an agreement. It brings understanding and respect among them and team members.
The practice of estimating business value on each story faces some problems like assigning a discrete value on small features or bits of functionality and determining the cost of the feature. However, that does not mean that we should not do ROI analysis of user stories or put business value to features .During such analysis and estimation a balance should be maintained between value and the cost associated. It is best done at the level of large user stories.