Project tracking ownership lies with whom?

Prakash R

My understanding. Please correct if wrong.

The delivery ownership of end solution lies with development team and not scrum master. In traditional method, the project manager is responsible for tracking of product and share the plan to the management. The PM prepares daily plan and has control on the project.

In agile, there is no such concept. There is no commitment to deliver on certain date from development team. Only rough estimation is done and if it is not completed in a sprint, the user stories can be moved to next sprint. Even though we can track the hours spent on daily basis, We can't surely say when the project will be completed?

Every one does their job and update the tasks. If it succeeds, all will get the credit. If it fails, every one sees others faces.

Others view on this please. Thanks

Scott Theus

Hi @Prakash R ,

That is a really good question...Who is "responsible" to get the work done on time and, more importantly, who is "accountable" if it is late?

At the heart of the matter, you are correct; the entire team is responsible for the success or failure of the project, the scrum master is there to guide the team and coordinate with the product owner, and the PO is there to prioritize the product backlog. 

It is a myth, however, that there is no committed date for delivery in Scrum. Remember, at the beginning of the development cycle, the PO defined WGLL (What Does Good Look Like) for the development effort, works with the team to break it down into user stories, and defines DoD (Definition of Done) for each story. The Scrum team then adds story points for all the stories in the Product Backlog, determines the Sprint Cycle, and estimates their velocity.  The total story points divided by the estimated velocity will equal the number of sprints needed to complete the work. Multiply the length of each sprint by the number of sprints to get the estimated duration of the development cycle and expected delivery date.

The PO is responsible for prioritizing the product backlog and adding stories to each sprint. The SM is responsible for ensuring the PO does not add stories beyond the team's velocity and for tracking/updating the velocity after each sprint.  The Scrum Team is responsible for completing the work they've committed to at the start of the Sprint. If as you mentioned, there are points left uncompleted at the end of the Sprint then the velocity may need to be reduced and the reasons for the shortage are addressed in the Retrospective. 

The Scrum Master is also responsible for communicating with the PO to ensure the scope of the Product Backlog remains stable.  If there is risk that the project may miss the delivery date the PO and the SM need to work together to determine 1) what can be completed by the due date and 2) what comes out of scope from the Product Backlog so the date can be met or 3) what can be done to increase velocity to meet the date with the original scope. 

This is the typical "Iron Triangle" of project management; if the delivery date is fixed then either Scope or Recourses have to change in order to mitigate the risk of missing the date. Since the PO is responsible for the scope of the project and for working with the business to set the delivery date, they are accountable for keeping that date. 

 

-Scott