Question 1

A3 Problem Solving

Accepted Answer

A3 problem-solving is a structured approach to problem solving. A3 problem-solving involves finding the root cause of a problem, developing a plan of action, and ensuring the plan is actioned.

Presented on a A3 size paper, the A3 process promotes simple structure, logical thinking, effective collaboration, and active communication. A3 thinking promotes a responsibility focused conversation about What is the right thing to do.

A3 Template / Report may have below areas:

Background
Current conditions
Goals/Targets
Analysis
Proposed Countermeasures
Plan
Follow Up

The aim with A3 is to not fix the symption, but to go to the root-cause of the problems and eliminate the problem efficiently in a way that's strategically aligned with the organizational goals.

Question 2

Customer Persona

Accepted Answer

A customer persona is a semi-fictional representation of your ideal prospect (or customer) based on market research and actual data about your present customers. It includes demographic data, behavior patterns, motivations, life-style, behaviors, pain points and objectives.

Customer personas are used to segment your customers into groups, identify their different needs, and tailor your product features or service to each group.

Organizations create customer personas for their product / business to make their offering relevant to their customer needs.

Question 3

Kaizen

Accepted Answer

Kaizen is a Japanese terms referring to incrementally achieving excellence through the relentless and endless pursuit of perfection.

In a business context Kaizen is continuous improvement of processes, operations and functions involving all employees.

Kaizen is Change for the Better.

Also see: Lean Thinking, Lean Waste, A3 Problem Solving, Lean Product Development, Value Stream Mapping.

Question 4

Product Owner

Accepted Answer

The Product Owner is accountable for maximizing the value of the product/service being built.

The Product Owner owns the decisions related to funds, works with the stakeholders and steers the direction of the product to optimize the outcomes and impact for the customers.

Question 5

Feature Teams

Accepted Answer

A feature team, is a cross-functional, cross-component team dedicated to building end-to-end customer features one by one.

A feature team usually consists of members from all areas of a system, such as: business, development, operations, product, and technology.

Building a feature team requires that team members are empowered to work on all the components of the system that avoids depending on other teams. This speeds up the development work and avoids waiting, delays and hand-offs significantly increasing the value throughput.

Feature teams will benefit from having Full stack engineers / generalizing specialists in the team. However, it's not expected that every team member knows every skill.

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/iBXIwUgCog/resources/5nVvAvL5Oj/Feature%20Teams.png (Feature Teams)

Source: Feature Teams Primer by Craig Larman and Bas Vodde

Question 6

Product Backlog Refinement (PBR)

Accepted Answer

Product Backlog Refinement (PBR) is the act of breaking down, adding details (such as: description, order and size) and further defining Product Backlog items into smaller more clearer items.

Product Backlog Items may be added, deleted and reordered.

The Product Backlog Refinement is a joint effort between the Product Owner and the Developers. The Product Owner is Accountable for the PBR.

PBR is not a prescribed scrum event, rather an ongoing activity.

PBR used to be called Product Backlog Grooming in older Scrum Guides.

Question 7

Splitting User Stories

Accepted Answer

When a big Product Backlog Item (or a User Story) can not be implemented within one Sprint, it's best to split it in to multiple smaller (thin) slices. Then the team can pick up these smaller items one by one for implementation over number of Sprints.

Smaller Product Backlog Items are easier to implement, require less effort, less investment and allow to get early feedback, reducing risk and maximizing learning.

For Example: A brand new ecommerce portal requires ways to accept online payments. The Accept Online Payments Product Backlog Item is pretty big in itself. It can be splitted (sliced) in few ways as below:

"Accept Online Payments" can be split in to four pieces as below:

1a. "Accept Visa" can be split in to pieces further:

The PBI 1aa. can be further split based on APIs available from Visa.

Also see:

User Story, Product Backlog Item

Question 8

Increment

Accepted Answer

The increment is the sum of all the Product Backlog items completed during a Sprint and the increments from previous Sprint.

Increment creates transparency of the value created to date.

Example: If a Scrum team is writing a book, a chapter of the book could be an increment. Another example could be iPhone 14 as an increment.

Also see: Incremental Development

Question 9

Progressive Refinement

Accepted Answer

In Scrum, the product is built incrementally and iteratively. As the product is used in the market, as new needs are identified, the Product Backlog emerges to adapt to the new needs.

Instead of refining the Product Backlog all at once at the begining, the Product Backlog is progressively refined over the period of development to accomodate the emerging needs.

Question 10

Collective Ownership

Accepted Answer

The practice of Collective Ownership of a Product / Code / Solution means the entire team collectively owns building of the solution / product and that every member has a responsibility to contribute to it.

It taps in to collective intelligence of the team members and reduces risk.

In Scrum the developers have collective ownership of the product being built.

Question 11

Agile Software Development

Accepted Answer

The [Agile Manifesto] (https://agilemanifesto.org) first coined the term 'Agile Software Development'. It refers to the way of developing Software (or Products / Services / Value) that is responsive to the customer's changing needs.

It is also referred as 'Agile Development' to refer to much broader applications outside the field of Software Development.

Question 12

Lead Time

Accepted Answer

Lead Time is the time it takes from identifying a need (could be a customer problem, feature request, defect raised, technical enhancement etc.) to making a solution available to customers.

Having a shorter the lead time equates to more responsiveness.

To reduce the lead time in Scrum:

A Self-Managing and Cross-Functional Scrum Team further improves the ability to improve the rate of value delivery hence a shorter Lead Time.

Question 13

Antifragile

Accepted Answer

When exposed to volatility and shocks, Fragile things break, Robust things resist it, Antifragile things benefit from it.

Antifragile systems thrive and grow when exposed to volatility, randomness, disorder, risk and uncertainty instead of breaking under their pressure.

In his book Antifragile, author Nassim Nicholas Taleb describes Antifragility is beyond resilience or robustness. The resilient resists shocks and stays the same; the antifragile gets better.

Nassim proposes rules for moving from the fragile toward the antifragile, through reduction of fragility or harnessing antifragility.

Antifragility (and fragility) can almost always be detected using a simple test of asymmetry: anything that has more upside than downside from random events (or certain shocks) is antifragile; the reverse is fragile.

Lessons to be antifragile:

Fragile items break under stress, antifragile items get better from it.
In order for a system to be antifragile, most of its parts must be fragile.
Antifragile systems work, because they build extra capacity when put under stress.

Question 14

User Story

Accepted Answer

A User Story is a story told by the user (of the product) of her/his challenges, or opportunities.

The original intent of the User Story has been that a User Story is to be told not written.

A User Story card is a promise for further communication. Communication that should happen between the Developers and the Customer or Stakeholders to create a shared understanding of the user's needs.

Further Reading:

Writing Effective User Stories Becoming User Centric with User Stories

Also see:

Product Backlog Item, Spike, Technical Debt, Splitting User Stories

Question 15

Burn Up Chart

Accepted Answer

A Burn Up Chart is a graphical representation used to track how much work has been completed against the time passed.

The graph starts at 0-0 at the beginning of the Sprint and will tend (Burn) up towards Right as the days pass and top as the work is completed.

A Burn Down Chart is a more effective tracking approach compared to the Burn Up Chart.

Also see: Burn Down Chart, Comulative Flow Diagram (CFD)

Question 16

Methodology

Accepted Answer

Methodology is a body of methods, rules, procedures and processes to achieve a goal. Usually methodology tries to define steps and answers to various situations. Most methodologies are bulky and rigid due to being prescriptive.

Question 17

Spike

Accepted Answer

Spike (concept originating from Extreme Programming) may be considered a type of a Product Backlog Item that is usually focused on research, exploration and investivation activity.

The purpose of a spike may be to explore the technical feasibility or create a quick proof of concept to gain better understanding about a particular requirement.

Since a Spike does not directly deliver stakeholder value, and due to unknown nature of the work involved, a spike should be subjected to a time-box.

The knowledge gained during this time-box (effort spent) should be presented at the Sprint Review and based on it the Product Owner may decide whether to puruse this feature / technology further or not. If the Product Owner decides to pursue it further, they may write a fresh Product Backlog Item and add it to the Product Backlog.

Also see: Product Backlog Item, User Story, Product Backlog Refinement

Question 18

Scrum Board

Accepted Answer

Visualizing the work of the Scrum Team via a board (either virtual or physical) is a common practice used by Scrum Teams. The purpose of creating such a board is to create transparency of information.

While the Scrum Guide doesn't prescribe any specific practice or a board, it's valuable tool to enhance shared understanding and empiricism.

The Scrum Board may contain the list of everything that's needed in the product (a Product Backlog) and the work of the current sprint (Sprint Backlog).

Question 19

Framework

Accepted Answer

A framework could be a collection of guidelines, rules and elements that provide a structure and boundary but not the prescription to achieve something.

For Example: The game of Chess (a framework) offers:

The chess board (8x8 squares)
The chess pieces (Material)
The rules about how each piece is placed, how each piece moves across the board

A chess player gets to decide their strategy, which piece they move and where, how they secure their king and how they use their queen. The game of the Chess doesn't prescribe any of this.

Question 20

Business Agility

Accepted Answer

Business agility is the capability to quickly change or adapt to changes in a business. Building Business Agility is an ongoing process and not a one-time event. Business agility can also be referred to as organizational agility, or adaptive business.

Business agility is the ability of a company to adjust to changes quickly. In business, agility involves the ability to change one’s strategy, operational model, and operating processes in response to internal and external changes.

This changes can be external, such as changing market conditions or government regulations. Internal changes can also have a big impact on business agility, such as disrupting the company culture or stakeholder loyalties, swiftly reacting to customer demands and quickly launching new products.

Organizations that have a high level of business agility will be better suited to take advantage of emerging opportunities, that will allow them to grow and overcome competition.