Subject: Software Engineering

Topic: Agile Software Development

Difficulty: High

Scrum Project Management requires very few artifacts, concentrating instead on delivering software that produces business value. The main artifacts in Scrum are:

Product Backlog: this is a complete list of the functionality that remains to be added to the product. The product backlog is prioritized by the product owner so that the team always works on the most valuable features first.

Sprint Backlog: this is a prioritized list of tasks the team needs to complete during the sprint.

Burn-down charts: these are used to show the amount of work remaining in a sprint and provide an effective way to determine at a glance whether a sprint is on schedule to have all planned work finished.

Roles on a Scrum team

There are three main roles involved in Scrum project management:

The Product Owner serves as the customer proxy and is responsible for representing the interests of the stakeholders and ensuring that the product backlog remains prioritized.

The Scrum Master is responsible for implementing the Scrum. SM differs from a traditional project manager in many key ways, including that the SM does not provide day-to-day direction to the team and does not assign tasks to individuals. A key part of this role is to remove impediments or issues that might slow the team down or stop activity that moves the project forward.

The Team is made up of a cross-functional group of 5-9 members who are responsible for developing the product. Scrum teams are self-organized will all members collectively responsible for getting the work done.