Scrum dev teams fails to meet sprint goals and commitments

February 27, 2024 kapilnakhwa

The Scrum team consistently takes on too many tasks, leading to a regular overflow of unfinished work into the next Sprint — without further consideration or inspection. This practice, especially when 30 to 40 percent of tasks routinely spill over, indicates a shift towards a ‘time-boxed Kanban’ style rather than adhering to Scrum principles. This habitual spillover suggests a need to reassess and realign the team’s approach to fit the Scrum framework better.
The Developers expand the scope of the Sprint beyond the agreed-upon Sprint Goal by adding extra, unnecessary work to the Product Backlog items in the Sprint Backlog. This issue arises when Developers disregard the original scope agreement with the Product Owner and unilaterally decide to enhance tasks without consultation. This behavior can lead to questionable allocation of development time, as it shifts focus away from the agreed priorities and goals, potentially impacting the team’s ability to deliver value effectively. This anti-pattern may reflect a disconnect between the Developers and the Product Owner, undermining the collaborative spirit essential for proper Scrum implementation.
The Developers select Product Backlog items unrelated to the Sprint Goal, resulting in a disorganized assortment of tasks. This issue often arises from a lack of a clear Sprint Goal or a goal that is too vague or simply a task list. Factors contributing to this pattern may include the need to address urgent technical issues, a desire to pursue new learning opportunities or disagreement with the product direction. If these scenarios don’t apply, it raises concerns about the team’s unity and effectiveness, suggesting they might operate more as individuals than as a cohesive Scrum team.
The Sprint Goal is not a collective decision of the Scrum team but rather dictated by an individual, often a dominant Product Owner or lead engineer. This scenario often unfolds in environments lacking psychological safety, where team members, despite foreseeing potential failure, remain silent and unopposed to the imposition. This pattern reflects a deeper issue within the team, signaling a departure from the core Scrum Values. Some team members may have resigned to the status quo, losing interest in continuous improvement and collaboration. In such cases, the team might be more accurately described as a group of individuals working in parallel, more focused on their paychecks than genuine teamwork and shared success.
Scrum teams, often new ones, set unattainably high Sprint Goals, leading to an oversized Sprint Backlog and inevitable underdelivery at Sprint’s end. This issue typically decreases as the team gains experience and better understands their capacity and customer problems. Mature Scrum teams learn to align their capabilities with their aspirations, ensuring they deliver the best possible value to customers and the organization.
Organization treats the Scrum team as a jack-of-all-trades unit, burdening them with various unrelated tasks hampering the team’s ability to formulate a cohesive Sprint Goal. Such a scenario is counterproductive to Scrum’s essence, which is about tackling complex problems through self-managing, autonomous teams and minimizing development risks. While Scrum excels at achieving specific objectives, its effectiveness diminishes when external stakeholders dictate the team’s workload in detail. This approach undermines Scrum’s core principle of focused, goal-oriented work and risks turning the team into a reactive rather than proactive unit.
The Scrum team focuses solely on the Sprint Goal, overlooking other critical tasks such as customer support and organizational demands. Effective Scrum practice requires balancing the Sprint Goal with responding to unexpected, yet crucial, issues. Ignoring significant problems, like a critical bug or a malfunctioning payment system, just because they fall outside the Sprint Goal can quickly erode stakeholder trust. Scrum is about adaptability and responding to new challenges, not rigidly adhering to an initial plan, turning the Sprint into a Waterfall-ish time box.
Scrum teams fail to meet their Sprint Goals with the precision of a Swiss clockwork. This ongoing issue undermines Scrum’s core objective: solving customer problems effectively and aiding organizational sustainability. Scrum’s usefulness relies on meeting the Sprint Goal, which should be the norm, not the exception. Continual failures, whether due to technical issues, skill shortages, or unforeseen complexities, question the validity of using Scrum. A successful application of Scrum involves a commitment to goals in return for decision-making autonomy and self-organization, not merely mimicking Kanban under the guise of Scrum.
The Product Owner presents a collection of tasks, lacking a cohesive objective, which leaves the Scrum team without clear direction. This situation indicates a potential misapplication of Scrum principles, suggesting that shifting to a more flow-based system like Kanban might better suit the team’s needs. Typically, this pattern arises when a Product Owner is either overwhelmed by stakeholder demands or lacks the experience to align tasks effectively with the team’s overall Product Goal.