Self-Organization and “Ideal” Size of Scrum Teams
Self-organization is the underlying principle of effective team dynamics as implicated in the Agile Manifesto: “Individuals and interactions over processes and tools”. The framework opportunity is granted to teams to allow themselves to organize and manage their own work in a way that would yield optimal performance for the sprints they will be running. In other words, the foundation of trust and autonomy, constant experimentation, and driving commitments and maximum business value will yield positive restructuring and optimize team dynamics across the period of collaboration.
According to the Scrum Guide by Ken Schwaber and Jeff Sutherland, “the optimal development team size is small enough to remain nimble and large enough to complete significant work within a sprint.” There is no ideal team size, although the Scrum Guide does mention a recommended range of three to nine members of the development team. As such, it is merely a guideline; and when circumstances require such size to go beyond the suggested borders, then it is up to the development team to determine what works for them to reconcile with the dynamic nature of sprint goals and achieve accordingly.
Influencers of Decisions & Value Delivery – An Overview
There are several variables in the team composition and sizing equation that would influence how effective and efficient the teams are in delivering value. Not only do those variables comprise of purely technological or capability in nature, such as technological innovation and expertise, but also contain a blend sociological and psychological attributes. This is asserted by Tom Demarco and Tim Lister in their book, Peopleware, in which their thesis exemplifies the sociological aspect of business then the technological.
Recommended Further Reading
The following materials may assist you in order to get the most out of this course:
Course Contents
Section 1: Agile Project Management
Section 2: Using the Agile Manifesto to Deliver Change
Section 3: The 12 Agile Principles
Section 4: The Agile Fundamentals
Section 5: The Declaration of Interdependence
Section 6: Agile Development Frameworks
Section 7: Introduction to Scrum
Section 8: Scrum Projects
Section 9: Scrum Project Roles
Section 10: Meet the Scrum Team
Section 11: Building the Scrum Team
Section 12: Scrum in Projects, Programs & Portfolios
Section 13: How to Manage an Agile Project
Section 14: Leadership Styles
Section 15: The Agile Project Life-cycle
Section 16: Business Justification with Agile
Section 17: Calculating the Benefits With Agile
Section 18: Quality in Agile
Section 19: Acceptance Criteria and the Prioritised Product Backlog
Section 20: Quality Management in Scrum
Section 21: Change in Scrum
Section 22: Integrating Change in Scrum
Section 23: Managing Change in Scrum
Section 24: Risk in Scrum
Section 25: Risk Assessment Techniques
Section 26: Initiating an Agile Project
Section 27: Forming the Scrum Team
Section 28: Epics and Personas
Section 29: Creating the Prioritised Product Backlog
Section 30: Conduct Release Planning
Section 31: The Project Business Case
Section 32: Planning in Scrum
Section 33: Scrum Boards
Section 34: Sprint Planning
Section 35: User Stories
Section 36: User Stories and Tasks
Section 37: The Sprint Backlog
Section 38: Implementation of Scrum
Section 39: The Daily Scrum
Section 40: The Product Backlog
Section 41: Scrum Charts
Section 42: Review and Retrospective
Section 43: Scrum of Scrums
Section 44: Validating a Sprint
Section 45: Retrospective Sprint
Section 46: Releasing the Product
Section 47: Project Retrospective
Section 48: The Communication Plan
Section 49: Formal Business Sign-off
Section 50: Scaling Scrum
Section 51: Stakeholders
Section 52: Programs and Portfolios