A stakeholder is convinced the product needs a feature nobody on the Scrum Team has prioritised, and asks the Scrum Master how, in Scrum, he is meant to get it built. Which TWO routes does Scrum actually give him?
Professional Scrum Master I, objective 3. Managing products with agility hard
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The options
Choose 2.
Not correct Ask the Developers to include it in the current Sprint, since it is the Developers who select the Sprint's work
Wrong, and the most tempting wrong answer because its premise is true — the Developers do select the items. They select from an ordered Product Backlog in conversation with the Product Owner, so this route skips the decision rather than making it.
Correct Try to convince the Product Owner, who owns the content and the ordering of the Product Backlog
Correct. Persuasion is the route Scrum names, and it is a genuine one — a Product Owner who never changes an order in response to evidence is not doing the job either.
Correct Raise it at the Sprint Review, where the Scrum Team and stakeholders collaborate on what to do next and the Product Backlog may be adjusted to meet new opportunities
Correct. The Review is the standing invitation for exactly this, with the Increment and the changed environment in front of everyone as evidence.
Not correct Raise it at the Sprint Retrospective, since that is where the Scrum Team decides what to change
Wrong on two counts. The Retrospective changes how the team works rather than what the product does, and it is the Scrum Team's own event rather than a stakeholder forum.
Why
Both legitimate routes end at the same person and differ only in setting: a direct case to the Product Owner, or the argument made publicly at the Sprint Review with the Increment on the table. Neither is a demand and neither guarantees anything, which is the point — a stakeholder's influence in Scrum is the strength of their case, not their seniority or their access to a friendly Developer. Learn to spot the two illegitimate routes: round the Product Owner to the Developers, and into the Retrospective.
Where this comes from
- Cited
- Scrum Guide section Product Owner
- What it says
- Those wanting to change the Product Backlog can do so by trying to convince the Product Owner.
Practise this
Reading one question is not practice. The trainer will draw a set from objective 3 and space the ones you get wrong.
Practise Professional Scrum Master I
More questions on this objective
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