The Scrum Mastery Challenge - Quiz #2

Every Tuesday we'll give you three challenging Scrum Mastery questions. The following Monday I share the answers with you in a new blog post, or you can get the answers by adding your email to my mailing list in the Contacts section at the bottom of the page. If you are feeling courageous, add your answers in the comment section of this blog.

My advice is to read each question thoroughly, and time-box each question to four minutes. To challenge yourself, keep the Scrum Guide and other browser windows closed. Have fun with the quiz, I hope this helps you learn and to be a better Scrum Master!

This week our questions get harder. Are you ready?

Question 1

Your Scrum Team has taken over the ongoing support and enhancements of a software product developed by a third party company, which was turned over to your Scrum Team 6 weeks ago.  After three Sprints of working on new enhancements, the Development Team has discovered a large amount of technical debt, which is making it a challenge to complete a “Done” Increment each Sprint.  What is the best option going forward?

1. Since Product Owners have no accountability for technical debt, the Development Team should keep a list of all technical debt in their own special Development Backlog, and every Sprint they should work to clean up the technical debt and make that work transparent in the Sprint Backlog.

2. The Development Team should collaborate with the Product Owner to make all of the technical debt transparent on the Product Backlog.  The Scrum Team should also form a working agreement to focus a small amount of their capacity each Sprint to remove and repay technical debt, until the Scrum Team agrees it is under control.

3. The Product Owner should stop all new product enhancements immediately after the current Sprint.  The lead developer should work with the Product Owner to quantify and set priority on the technical debt.  The Development Team should then remove all of the technical debt in hardening Sprints, before proceeding with any new enhancements.

4. The Scrum Master should break the Development Team into two teams.  The Scrum Master should then assign one Development Team to focus on technical debt, and have the other Development Team focus on working with the Product Owner to build new enhancements.

Question 2

Which of the following may be inputs into Sprint Planning? Select all vapid answers that apply.

1. Product Backlog

2. Past performance of Development Team (e.g. velocity, throughput)

3. Product Increment

4. Projected Capacity of Development Team for current Sprint

5. Sprint Goal

6. Definition of "Done"

7. Definition of "Ready"

8. All of the above

Question 3

The Scrum Team has had a challenging Sprint, and will not be able to meet their Sprint Goal. Two members were unexpectedly out sick, the Product Owner was in training for the last 3 days of the Sprint and has not been able to provide feedback, and test environments were down for a good portion of the Sprint, hence the Development Team could not finish a lot of testing. The day before the Sprint Review and Sprint Retrospective, the Development Team pushes hard to cancel these two events. As Scrum Master what do you do? Pick the best answers.

1. Since only a Product Owner may cancel a Sprint Review, work with her to cancel the Sprint to avoid wasting the stakeholders time.

2. Suggest the Sprint be extended by two or three days to give the Development Team time to finish testing and to get feedback from the Product Owner,

3. Cancel the Sprint Review because there isn't anything to demo, but keep the Sprint Retrospective because there are some important topics to discuss and improve upon next Sprint.

4. Uphold Scrum by not cancelling these events, and help the Development Team understand the benefits of being transparent and for the need to collaborate with stakeholders on the upcoming Sprint. Help the developers understand that the Sprint Retrospective is needed to inspect what happened and to improve next Sprint.