Scrum in short is a development project management framework that supports “The Art of Possible” principle. It means that developers commit to implement only features that are possible to deliver in the current iteration. It though forces the whole development team to see the whole product – not only “their” part. There is no “their” part – Scrum team is responsible for the product as a whole – everyone is responsible for the success.
Scrum supports self-organizing and self-managing teams and is one of the techniques from so-called Agile movement. Scrum is a way of working but it does not impose any technology or concrete tools. It’s about communication and openness.
Many people think that Scrum is some guerrilla method i.e. “We don’t document anything – just write the code”. It is not. Scrum does not tell you whether to document you project or not. It’s the definition of done. You can define done feature as fully documented, tested, implemented and accepted by customer. And then you have full documentation – if you need it and want it.
Why Scrum?
Scrum boosts productivity focusing development team on delivering the product in short (2 weeks to one month) iterations. It’s iterative and incremental process. It means that you deliver product feature by feature – not the whole product at once. Huge advantage of this is that you are not able to define and predict every feature your customer will need in the future – Scrum knows it and uses this as an advantage. You are also not able to predict all the technical and other problems you will have for sure – Scrum copes with that too.
Scrum encourages development team to continuously communicate your progress and problems to the customer. Customers are more happy to see constant and real progress in the project – they can see the demo of newly introduced features after every iteration. Then the feedback loop is shorter and you can learn very quickly whether what you’re implementing is what your customer really needs.
Customers are also more satisfied if they know about problems earlier – they can then react quickly changing some priorities or removing some problematic requirements (or simply postpone them to the next release).
Scrum teams deliver. And they deliver good quality products faster that using old and thick methodologies.
Scrum accepts the fact that software development is a difficult and complex domain. It doesn’t sweeps problems under the carpet – it shows them in very bright light. Scrum knows that you can solve your problem ONLY when you know them.
Most people responsible for managing projects have been taught a deterministic approach to project management that uses detailed plans, Gantt charts, and work schedules. Scrum is the exact opposite. Unlike these tools, which practically fight against the project’s natural momentum, Scrum shows management how to guide a project along its optimal course, which unfolds as the project proceeds.
Modern information systems are more and more complex – the easy systems finish at the university door after graduation. The more complex system, the more likely it is that central control system will break down. This is the reason companies decentralize and governments deregulate – relinquishing control to independent agents is a time-honored approach to dealing with complexity. Scrum travels this well-known path by moving control from a central scheduling and dispatching authority to the individual teams doing the work. The more complex the project, the more necessary it becomes to delegate decision making to independent agents who are close to work.
Another reason that Scrum works is that it dramatically shortens the feedback loop between customer and developer, between wish list and implementation, and between investment and return on investment.
Scrum doesn’t focus on delivering just any increment of business value; it focuses on delivering the highest priority business values defined by the customer (Product Owner).
Still don’t believe?
Scrum turns small teams into managers of their own fate. Scrum Teams accept a challenge and then figure out how to meet that challenge, detouring around roadblocks in creative ways that could not be planned by a central control and dispatching center.Give Scrum a try – you will be fully satisfied as many companies are. The biggest names that use Scrum are: Yahoo!, Microsoft, Intel and Nokia. And it was all started by Toyota and their Lean management. If you don’t trust these names you’re hopeless 
Resources:
If you want to learn more about Scrum please refer to the following resource list:
http://java2jee.blogspot.com/2008/04/how-to-start-with-scrum.html – Good source of links and books for the beginners and more advanced Scrum users
http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Agile-Management-Google-Jeff-Sutherland – Jeff Sutherland on a sort of “lessons learned” from a project with Google
http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Introduction-Agile-Stacia-Broderick – Introducing of Agile (and Scrum) to traditional managers
http://www.gfi-lab.fr/te/Scrum-gfi.pdf – Scrum presentation from GFI technical evening
Written by Przemek Bielicki
