Cutover Plans and Date
My team uses an excel sheet to track cutover plans. To me this is an anti-pattern ,however, the team is new and we just transitioned from 3 week sprints to 2 week sprints after some convincing that 2 weeks sprints would be beneficial for the team. We have a release scheduled in our current sprint and two members of the team suggested that we add start and end dates to all of the cutover items. Their reasoning is that it clearly identifies dependencies and will show accountability. I was a bit confused due to the fact that we discuss these items in our daily scrum and manage our stories in Jira. I had a coaching session on the issues to address that dependencies should be monitored in the Daily Scrum and the team shares accountability. Furthermore, I addressed that the other scrum ceremonies are events in which dependencies can be brought up as well. The 2 team members then stated that it helps with dependencies outside of the scrum team (They are referring to our platform teams which assist our application ). Their reasoning is that dates help with planning and coordination of event planning with our platform teams since they would give dates to our platform team for follow up on task closure. Should I support the team in this direction? What are some suggestion that I can make?
If the team believes that adding dates or specifically calling out dependencies would be helpful, why not try?
On the matter of Product Backlog Refinement, the Scrum Guide does say that:
This is an ongoing activity to add details, such as a description, order, and size. Attributes often vary with the domain of work.
Attributes could be things like dates, both due dates or start dates. Attributes could also be specific dependencies between Product Backlog Items. In some contexts, considering this information as part of refinement and making it explicit could be helpful when the Product Owner is ordering the Product Backlog or when planning a Sprint.
Without a lot more information, I can't say for sure if the team's ideas for managing dates and dependencies is useful, but it isn't inconsistent with the Scrum Guide. It may be worth experimenting to see how it works and then revisiting at a future Sprint Retrospective.
My team uses an excel sheet to track cutover plans. To me this is an anti-pattern ,however, the team is new and we just transitioned from 3 week sprints to 2 week sprints after some convincing that 2 weeks sprints would be beneficial for the team. We have a release scheduled in our current sprint
It doesn't matter. The "anti-pattern" is still there, and that's what you need to resolve. Delivery is being managed by schedule rather than by value.
The dependencies you describe cannot reveal accountability: they can only evidence the lack of it.