Below, are some more commonly observed anti-patterns, seen in Scrum.
The list in is not conclusive.
Overall Sprint | Daily Scrum | Sprint Planning | PBR | Sprint Review | Retrospective
During a Sprint
- Too many people (beyond 3-9 recommended in Scrum) consider themselves as ‘team members’. Entire functional groups (component teams) that belong to the same reporting structure consider themselves, as teams.
- Managers, PMO and other marginally involved in work people get involved
- Too many unresolved/undiscovered external dependencies on groups and individuals that work outside of Sprint.
- Team members have only partial dedication to Sprint and do side-work, elsewhere. People that contribute to Sprint work are not on a team
- Sprint duration is not consistent: sprints are shortened or made longer. Sprints are too long (> 30 days
- Scrum Master role is passed around from one person to another as a “hot potato”, due to the fact that nobody is able to perform the role well. Common reasons: lack of Scrum knowledge, lack of comfort with raising dysfunctions, seeing no personal benefit in performing the role.
During Daily Scrum
- People, arriving late to a meeting that is very short, to begin with
- People, attending remotely, with poor connection and no visual support
- Focusing too much on resolutions (this is to be done after daily scrum), not on discoveries
- Daily scrum, becoming a status report, where team members ‘report’ their deliverable to Scrum Master (or someone else, who self-invited, e.g. manager, PMO)
- Too much focus and updates of electronic tools, taking time from a meeting. Scrum Master, becoming tool specialists” / administrators, making updates, on behalf of others
- Deep dives into detailed discussions OR… Referencing to ticket numbers only, without sharing meaningful content about WIP
- Refinement of backlog items or planning of future sprints, instead of focusing on a current sprint
- Command & control behavior towards team members, from a Scrum Master or among team members, e.g. direct task assignment by leads or line managers
- Product Owner comes uninvited and takes over a meeting
- Too many “I am here just to observe” people, eventually, leading to too many side-bar discussions and a loss of focus. This follows the classic pattern: as a number of communication nodes (people) increases, so does a number of communication channels (discussion threads), eventually, leading to excessive communication
- Team members, are not being able to clearly articulate/express themselves
- Some people are overly talkative; others very silent. Monologues, arguing, disrespect, excessive feedback, loss of focus and orientation
During Sprint Planning
- Product Owner did not clearly articulate to a team sprint goals
- Work proposed for next Sprint is not well refined
- Not enough effort is made to validate that planned work is really doable (DoR is not met)
- Planned work has strong (and asynchronous) dependencies
- Planned work by far exceeds a teams capacity (overall, skill set)
- Team’s planning is treated as a hard commitment
- No (or little) indication that the whole team plans together (everyone plans their individual work)
- Product Owner is not explicitly informed about what a team is planning to work on
During Product Backlog Refinement
- Product Owner is not present and/or sends in a ‘proxy’ or BA, instead
- Not all team members are present. OR… too many people join, including uninvited guests
- Refining backlog items that are low in priority
- Too much focus on generating estimate numbers, not on shared understanding, a.k.a. as CCC (card, conversation, confirmation)
- Attempts to solve/implement backlog items. Spending too much time on “how to build” details, instead of understanding “what to build”
- Keeping Product Owner and stakeholders in a meeting, beyond their interest (e.g. technical discussions)
During Sprint Review
- Meeting is made extremely short and treated as a formality (‘Scrum mandate’)
- Review turns into a ‘town-hall’ with political agenda, instead of being a working session
- Product Owner and/or key stakeholders/users are not present
- Team shows, a ticketing system (mostly), power points or lines of code, instead of working software
- The same person “shows” and takes all the credit for a team’s deliverable
During Sprint Retrospective
- No feedback from Sprint Review is taken in
- Managers, Product Owner, others – come uninvited
- Lack of safety and comfort in a meeting. Too much hostility
- Too much political correctness and lack of openness
- Same people speak up. Same people remain silent
- Same impediments are being raised in each Retrospective, nothing gets resolved