How to Measure Agile Team Members' Performance

The key elements of agile (say Scrum) methodology of software development is the team is cross-functional, collaborative and self-organized. Means, in Scrum, the entire team is responsible to execute the Sprint tasks; not the individual member of the team. So, the success or failure of the Sprints is based on the cumulative performance of the team. There is, however, a problem in judging an individual's performance; because each team member is not highlighted much during the product development.

How to Conduct Daily Scrum Meeting

Daily stand-up meeting is one of the most critical meetings in agile methodology of software development. It is a quick review of each team member's last days work, planning for the next day's work and impediments the member is facing. ScrumMaster looks into the impediment and can resolve it upfront or in a sidebar meeting.

Role of the Product Owner in Scrum (Agile)

In Scrum, one of the flavors of agile methodology of software development, there are three fundamental roles: the Product Owner, The ScrumMaster and the team. In current post let us talk about the Product Owner's role in detail.

The Product Owner represents the customer's interest and prioritizes the backlog of tasks according to the business needs. She/ he participates in the Sprint Planning meeting and evaluates the entire product backlog, prioritizes them and include in or exclude from the next Sprint. She/ he has the final say whether the task should be reprioritized or dropped. The team working on the product development can negotiate with the Product Owner on the priority of the task, but the final discretion lies with the Product Owner only. The Product Owner also decides the acceptance criteria for the potentially shippable product after the Sprint is completed.

Defining Impediments in Scrum (Agile)

Impediments are the roadblocks or hindrances faced by the team in agile methodology of software development. To make the definition look more clear and practical, impediments are any causes which will delay team's deliverables or stop from progressing in a task and eventually costing the team's productivity.

 

Role of ScrumMaster in Scrum (Agile)

 

In Scrum, one of the flavors of agile methodology of software development, there are three fundamental roles: the Product Owner, The ScrumMaster and the team. In current post let us talk about ScrumMaster's role in detail.

ScrumMaster acts as a facilitator for the team and is co-ordinator between the Product Owner and the team. He also co-ordinates with the management and the company's support functions to remove any roadblocks or impediments faced by the te team. Typical "command and control" style of management does not produce results for the ScrumMasters. In fact, there is no place for such a manager in agile.

Introduction to Agile Method of Software Development

Agile methodology enables product development incrementally and in a lightweight manner. The process adapts to the changing business scenarios and equips team to collaborate in every task. Agile can be interpreted differently by the different pool of practitioners. For team, it provides opportunity to be flexible, cross-functional and self-organized. For managers, it is a set of best engineering practices that allow rapid delivery of high quality software. For stakeholders, it is business approach that aligns development with customer needs and company goals.

Agile is implemented with flavours such as Scrum, Extreme Programming (XP) and Agile Unified Process (AUP).