Tech.IT Forward #4 - Topic 2: Measuring and Improving Development Process Effectiveness

"Can one Scrum be approached for all projects?”

“Approaching scrum helps a team be Agile, correct?”

“Trust in stakeholders is important, how can I build trust by taking advantage of Scrum?”

“I want to improve processes with Scrum's metrics”

1. What Are Scrum metrics?

Scrum metrics are a powerful set of numbers or statistics used to measure the efficiency, effectiveness and progress of Scrum teams.

Scrum metrics are various, some important ones are: Velocity Report, Sprint Burndown Chart, Release Burndown Chart, Cycle Time Report, Lead Time Report, Cumulative Flow Diagram, Defect Density, and Team Happiness.

2. But why are they important, in general?

Scrum metrics are nice to have. The metrics provide valuable insights into team performance, project health, what needs improvement, and ensure that stakeholders get the values they demand.

3. How To Measure Scrum's metrics?

Moreover, the insights are visualized the hidden truth of project and team status, allowing us to understand project progress, identify bottlenecks, and improve the processes of Scrum teams.

To measure Scrum metrics, you can use story points. Once you have assigned story points, Jira can automatically generate and display reports for you.

Here are the benefits of these reports:

• Velocity Report
  • Improved Planning: Helps teams make more accurate predictions about how much work they can complete in future sprints.
  • Performance Insights: Provides insights into the team's performance over time, helping to identify areas for improvement.
  • Transparency: Offers a clear and transparent view of the team's progress and capacity, which can be shared with stakeholders.
  • Risk Management: Helps identify potential risks early by highlighting inconsistencies or declines in velocity.

• Sprint Burndown Chart:
  • Transparency: Provides a clear and visual representation of the team's progress, making it easy for everyone to see how the sprint is progressing.
  • Early Warning: Helps identify potential issues early, allowing the team to take corrective actions before it's too late.
  • Motivation: Can serve as a motivational tool, encouraging the team to stay focused and work towards their goals.
  • Improved Planning: Helps teams improve their planning and estimation skills over time by providing feedback on their progress.
• Sprint Deployment Frequency Report:
  • Visibility: Provides clear visibility into how often code changes are being deployed, helping teams understand their deployment cadence.
  • Continuous Improvement: Helps teams identify areas for improvement in their deployment processes, such as reducing bottlenecks or increasing automation.
  • Quality Assurance: Frequent deployments can indicate a healthy continuous delivery pipeline, while infrequent deployments may signal potential issues.
  • Stakeholder Communication: Offers a transparent view of deployment activity, which can be shared with stakeholders to demonstrate progress and reliability.
• Cycle Time Report:
  • Process Efficiency: Helps teams understand how efficiently they are completing tasks and identify areas for improvement.
  • Bottleneck Identification: Highlights stages in the workflow where tasks are delayed, allowing teams to address bottlenecks.
  • Predictability: Provides insights into how long tasks typically take to complete, improving the team's ability to make accurate forecasts and commitments.
  • Continuous Improvement: Encourages a culture of continuous improvement by providing data that teams can use to refine their processes.
• Cumulative Flow Diagram:
  • Workflow Visualization: Provides a clear and visual representation of the workflow, making it easy to see the state of tasks over time.
  • Bottleneck Identification: Highlights stages in the workflow where tasks are delayed, allowing teams to address bottlenecks.
  • Process Efficiency: Helps teams understand how efficiently they are completing tasks and identify areas for improvement.
  • Predictability: Provides insights into how work items flow through the process, improving the team's ability to make accurate forecasts and commitments.
• Team Happiness
  • Helps Scrum Team to Be Agile
  • Helps Scrum Team to Building trust
  • Helps Scrum Team to Continuous improvement

With the metrics, your project can be Agile, Continuous Improvement, and building Trust.

Let's enjoy my talk above to grasp the best practices in my company for taking advantage of these metrics.