I’m on a journey to go through the complete Scrum Guide (2020 version) and turn it inside out. Hoping to find a satisfying answer to the question: “Does Scrum actually work?”
I started with “Purpose of Scrum” and “Empiricism”. I came to the conclusion that the premise of Scrum is sound. It is a framework that helps create a high-value product or service in a complex environment. It is based on the learning cycle of empiricism. Scrum uses transparency, inspection and adaptation as the foundation for empiricism. All other aspects of the Scrum Guide should be based on this.
In this chapter, I will discuss the Scrum Values. I aim to answer the following questions:
Do the Scrum Values support the creation of high-value products or services in a complex environment?
Do the Scrum Values support empiricism?
The Scrum Values
The Scrum values were introduced in the book “Agile Software Development with Scrum” (Schwaber and Beedle, 2002). When the Scrum Guide came to be, they were absent for a time. They returned in the 2016 version of the Scrum Guide.
The Scrum Values are Commitment, Focus, Openness, Respect, and Courage.
The Scrum Values should give the Scrum Team and its stakeholders direction towards how they work together and what they can expect from each other. The way the Scrum Team and the stakeholders collaborate should reinforce the Scrum Values.
The Scrum Values and Empiricism
The Scrum Guide bluntly states that the Scrum Values bring the pillars of empiricism to life. When the Scrum Team and the stakeholders embody the Scrum Values, transparency, inspection and adaptation have the highest impact.
In other words: when the Scrum Values are not being upheld, empiricism will suffer. And as empiricism is the foundation of Scrum, this means that the Scrum Team will most probably not enjoy the (full) benefits of Scrum.
There’s a reason why the Scrum Values are one of the first topics of the Scrum Guide: they are deemed essential. Ignoring or failing to uphold the Scrum Values will damage empiricism which will damage the team’s effectiveness in using Scrum.
Ignoring or failing to uphold the Scrum Values will damage empiricism which will damage the team’s effectiveness in using Scrum.
At least, this is what the Scrum Guide says. But does it make sense? Let’s find out now.
Commitment, Focus and Empiricism
Commitment and Focus are strongly related.
A Scrum Team commits to their goals. Examples of such goals are the Product Goal (the future state of the product to plan against) and the Sprint Goal (the objective for the Sprint). A Scrum Team also commits to supporting each other, to work as a team.
Why would commitment impact empiricism? I believe the answer to that lies in the complexity of the environment. Teams use Scrum because their environment is complex. This means that they don’t know what will happen. This requires them to take small steps, verify these steps and then decide what to do next.
They will need to use empiricism. What happens with a lack of commitment? Here are three logical scenarios:
When a Scrum Team doesn’t commit to doing this experiment, they will have nothing to learn from. So they will not know what will be the next best bet.
When a Scrum Team does an experiment but doesn’t commit to learning from it, they also will not know what would be best to do next.
And finally, when a Scrum Teams does an experiment, learns from it but fails to take actions based upon the learnings, they will not maximize the value of the product either.
There’s more that can go wrong with commitment and empiricism. When some members of the ScrumTeams don’t commit to helping each other to achieve the goals, they will run the risk of not meeting the goal, harming potential learning and decision-making. When stakeholders of the Scrum Teams don’t commit to reviewing the product Increment, this will also harm the potential learning.
A Scrum Team should focus on the goals and avoid working on things that don’t contribute to achieving the goals. A lack of focus can lead to unclarity in what the team did and how it contributed to the goals. It will harm the team’s ability to learn from their experiments and their next steps based on the learnings.
Therefore I conclude it makes a lot of sense to have Commitment and Focus as Scrum Values to bring transparency, inspection and adaptation to life. They are required for empiricism.
Openness, Respect, Courage and Empiricism
Openness, Respect and Courage strongly influence each other. Without respect, people may not have the courage to be open about difficult issues.
The Scrum Team and their stakeholders should have respect for each other’s capabilities and opinions. A lack of respect can result in people not voicing their ideas or not being allowed to contribute the way they believe makes the most sense. It will inevitably lead to subpar results and incomplete information. This then has an impact on the team’s ability to learn from what they did and as a result on making the decisions on what to do next to achieve the goals.
A lack of courage can result in someone not voicing their concerns or an unwillingness to explore alternatives to achieve goals. Both are harmful in a complex environment where you don’t know what will happen.
You should have all concerns on the table and have the willingness to fail with an experiment. That’s part of the game. A failed experiment should be applauded. You learn more from failures than from success.
A lack of openness often is a result of issues with respect and courage. Obviously, it also can be an issue when respect and courage are upheld. Insufficient openness can also lead to stakeholders' inability to properly inspect the results of the Scrum team.
Openness, Respect and Courage are important to bring transparency, inspection and adaptation to life. So, they are important for empiricism to work.
Verdict on the Scrum Values in Scrum
The Scrum Values of Commitment, Focus, Openness, Respect and Courage have a strong relationship with the pillars of empiricism. When the Scrum Values aren’t upheld, a Scrum Team will struggle with Transparency, Inspection and Adaptation.
Scrum Teams may want to focus on the accountabilities, events and artefacts of Scrum. They may be tempted to see the Scrum Values as generic, vague or fluffy. However, I argue the Scrum Values are crucial elements of Scrum. I agree with the statement that they bring the pillars of empiricism to life.
Scrum is aimed at complex product environments, is built upon empiricism and requires upholding the ScrumValues.
Scrum is aimed at complex product environments, is built upon empiricism and requires upholding the ScrumValues.
I will continue my journey by inspecting the Scrum Team. This will be my next article on the topic.
Good read.