Effective Software Project Management

The Launching Phase of an Iterative SDPM Strategy for the SCRUM Model

Figure 20-3 illustrates the Launching Phase of an Iterative SDPM strategy for the SCRUM model.

Figure 20-3. The Launching Phase of an Iterative SDPM strategy for the SCRUM model

SCRUM departs from the other models in the Iterative SDPM strategy in that it is a customer-driven model. The Product Owner (the customer) generates the Product Backlog List and participates in a Sprint Planning Meeting at the beginning of each iteration. At that meeting, the updated Product Backlog is discussed and a decision made as to what is to be developed in the next Sprint. The Sprint Team spends the last half of the Sprint Planning Meeting deciding how to produce the agreed upon deliverables.

The Launching Phase is a project team activity. They have agreed with the customer as to what is to be built in this Sprint and have put together a preliminary plan as to how they will accomplish it. In the Launching Phase they need to establish (or re-establish) the rules of the engagement. SCRUM teams are typically a small team of subject matter experts (SMEs). If they have worked together before, the rules of the engagement have been crafted in earlier projects and are merely reconfirmed here. If they have not worked together before, their first pass at the rules of the engagement is probably subject to change as they learn each other’s ...