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How to use user stories in Scrum

Last post 08:58 pm November 6, 2024 by Ian Mitchell
1 reply
Pablo Casa
10:23 am November 6, 2024

Hi all,

I worked for 3 years as a scrum master for a Insurance company. 

Last week I started as a scrum master at a new company and already see huge differences how they use scrum.

I will describe how we used user stories and my previous company.  And im looking for how it should be.

Previous company:

1.PO describes short on a high level what the user should be able to do after implementation of this user story.
2.PO and the business analist discusses the user story and business analist creates and document with technical requirements and describes the solution. 
3.If requirements and solution is described than the user story is set to Ready for Refinement.
4.During refinement sessions the whole scrum team is together and will discuss the user story. If everything is clear. We poker to give story points.
5.If everything is clear than we set the user story to Ready For Planning.
6.When this user story is picked up in the sprint the developer builds and uses the output thats attached in the user story

Current company:

1 Product
5 Teams
1 Product owner
Each team has a Team lead that describes High Level Designs

Developers creates Low Level Designs based on information given by the Team lead

PO describes short on a high level what the user should be able to do after implementation of this user story.

Till here everything is Design Phase. Nothing is yet build

Im not very familiar with this approach. This looks more like a waterfall method to me?

So now im wondering how i should proceed as a scrum master?

How should it normally be?

Should you include a user story in a sprint only when everything is clear. Like solution, technical specifications like Class diagram etc. Or is this part of the user story during the sprint? So should de LLD be made during the sprint as part of the user story? This looks tricky to me because you may need help from others to come to a solution.

Hopefully someone can help me with this :)

 

Regards,

Pablo

 


 

 

 

 

 

 

Ian Mitchell
08:58 pm November 6, 2024

The work.on a Product Backlog is there to allow Sprint Goals to be identified and committed to in Sprint Planning. A Sprint Goal addresses and mitigates a significant risk or uncertainty in a complex challenge. Product Backlog items, such as user stories, are there to enable this conversation.

Product Backlog refinement is the art and science of making work ready for Sprint Planning. 

Enough refinement should therefore be done to ensure that the question in Sprint Planning is never: "Can we do this work?". The Developers know they can. Rather, the question is: "Should we? Should we do this work in order to achieve a good and meaningful Sprint Goal? What would that Sprint Goal be?"

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