THINGS ABOUT SCRUM THAT NOBODY LIKES TO TALK ABOUT

3 Elephants In the Scrum Room (Part 2)

Who is paying for this?

This is Part 2 of the article “3 Elephants In the Scrum Room”.

If the product you are working on brings revenue, then it’s clear how each Sprint Goal contributes to the business. In this case, it is straightforward to relate the teams’ work to the success of the company because the most obvious metric (revenue) shows that we are doing the right things.

But sometimes it is very difficult to relate teams output to any value. Or even worse, some companies evaluate their teams using harmful metrics. For example, it can happen with:

• External sponsors
• Internal sponsors
• Startups

External sponsors (other companies)

External sponsors want to get as much as possible for their money. Most of the time, external sponsors push the other party to accept the (financial) risk for not delivering. They aim for a contract with a fixed budget, timeline, and usually a vague scope.

If that is the case, think twice before choosing Scrum. It doesn’t fit into this business model.