Interesting Q&A for PSM exam

Where did this question come from? Honestly, none of the answers strike me as totally correct.

I can immediately eliminate the second option (2 teams of 6 and 4 people). The idea of a separate QA team isn't a part of Scrum. Each team is expected to have the skills necessary to get work to Done, designing, implementing, and testing the work. Although it may be necessary to have independent QA in some environments, it doesn't mean that QA is fully removed and put into a separate team.

The third choice (3 teams of 4, 3 and 3 people) also seems suspect. It says that each team is cross-functional, but being cross-functional independently of other considerations doesn't necessarily make for a good team.

The first (2 teams of 6 and 4 people) and fourth (1 team of 10 people) options seem viable. Although 10 people is larger than the recommended Development Team size, the team size is simply a recommendation, and it's only 1 person larger than the recommended size. I can definitely see a Scrum Team of 10 people operating well. The best part of the first choice is that the developers self-organized. Still, I don't believe that the developers should exclusively decide on their own since they operate within an organizational context. Although the developers should have a say in how the team is organized, it's not clear who was in the meeting and was involved in making the decision.

Honestly, I'd probably choose the first option, even though it is only correct in the Scrum Guide's face-value and not broader organizational issues.

How can they be divided into teams?

Why not get them to self-organize into teams? As Scrum Master, you may give them a goal and rules to facilitate this. For example:

- Each team ought to have all the skills required to craft "Done", finished work

- The optimal team size is between 3 and 9 people

Why isn't this key Scrum Master practice -- of creating bounded environments for change, within which teams might take action -- one of the options presented? Where does this question come from and what gives you reason to have confidence in it?

Only need to clarify the scrumguide rules, each team of 3-9 people, self-organized by themselves,

Why do  want to "divided"?

• 2 teams of 6 and 4 people (after a short meeting the developers decided this is the best option)
• 2 teams of 6 and 4 people (because it is good to have a separate QA team) - Not a valid - First to eliminate
• 3 teams of 4, 3 and 3 people (each team is cross-functional)
• 1 team of 10 people (because there is no reason to divide) - Not a valid - Second to eliminate

Answer:

Tips :The optimal team size is between 3 and 9 people

So,

Correct one: 2 teams of 6 and 4 people (after a short meeting the developers decided this is the best option) or 

3 teams of 4, 3 and 3 people (each team is cross-functional)

Thanks.

I also have doubts about this question's effectiveness at helping you prepare for a PSM exam, but nevertheless, it has stimulated an interesting discussion here.

I don't think Scrum specifically prohibits any of these options, although there does seem to be one that most closely represents self-organizing Development Teams.

Regarding a separate QA team, it is possible, and it might be effective; but that could well require an adjustment to the role of QA engineers.

Specifically in the past, we had 2 QA engineers who stepped back from the responsibility of writing all automated tests for what was being developed, and instead focused on helping all other software engineers gain the skills to write their own automated tests.

This new QA team became a support for the engineers themselves, rather than being part of a Scrum Team. They were servant leaders, helping to bring out the best in others, and took time to advise on new approaches towards quality, and highlight trends that were related to defects, or other quality issues.

Imagine you are a Scrum Master in a small Organization that tries to adopt Scrum. There are 10 developers and the Product Owner. How can they be divided into teams? Choose all applicable options:

 

•  2 teams of 6 and 4 people (after a short meeting the developers decided this is the best option)
•  2 teams of 6 and 4 people (because it is good to have a separate QA team)
•  3 teams of 4, 3 and 3 people (each team is cross-functional)
•  1 team of 10 people (because there is no reason to divide

I'm curious, from where comes this question?

I can't believe that this one should be asked in the Scrum Open Assessment and especially not in the PSM I exam. It's too ambiguous.



If we take into account from the Scrum Guide that

              - a team should be self-organizing

              - optimal team size is between 3 and 9 people

              - Development Teams are cross-functional, with all the skills as a team necessary to create a product Increment;

              - Scrum recognizes no sub-teams in the Development Team, regardless of domains that need to be addressed like testing, architecture, operations, or business analysis

Than for an exam

the most correct answer should be:

2 teams of 6 and 4 people (after a short meeting the developers decided this is the best option)

Follows the 'size 3 to 9 people' rule and the 'self-organizing' rule, impliciet you could assume that the Team also follows the 'cross-functional'-rule for the both teams, but in an exam you can only go on what is stated in the question, so that is why it is ambiguous.

Second best answer:

 3 teams of 4, 3 and 3 people (each team is cross-functional)

Follows the 'size 3 to 9 people' rule and the 'cross-functional'-rule

Wrong answers: 

 2 teams of 6 and 4 people (because it is good to have a separate QA team)

sins against the 'Scrum recognizes no sub-teams' rule.

 1 team of 10 people (because there is no reason to divide

sins against the 'size 3 to 9 people' rule



----------------------------------------------------------



In reality, if you have experience with managing teams of 9 developers, you would manage a team of 10 persons just as easy.



Splitting teams that work on the same Product Backlog will always create extra overhead, so the previous 'second best answer' of 3 teams (4,3,3) would create a lot of overhead. It's upto the Dev Team, PO and SM to verify if such overhead is warranted.



If you want to keep through to the Scrum Guide the best answer would again be: 

2 teams of 6 and 4 people (after a short meeting the developers decided this is the best option)

In my personal experience, I use Scrum of Scrums if I had to split a team into two teams and in that case the extra overhead is better than 1 team of 11 persons.

In case of managing three teams, I prefer using the Nexus framework, but there I would keep myself to the upper team limit of 9 persons, even trying to stay under that with an max averige of 7 or 8. Ofcourse keeping the 'cross-functional'-rule in mind.

I'm going to agree with everyone about questioning the source of this.  But I will give you my answer and believe it or not, it is short.

2 teams of 6 and 4 people (after a short meeting the developers decided this is the best option)

And only because of the words in parens that indicate it was decided upon by the developers and not dictated to them by someone else.

2 teams of 6 and 4 people (after a short meeting the developers decided this is the best option) the key here is "developers decided".