Daily Stand-up

The Daily Scrum, as defined in the Scrum Guide, is a 15-minute event for the development team. It clarifies that the Product Owner and Scrum Master can also participate as developers if they are actively working on sprint backlog items. However, the Scrum Guide doesn’t explicitly mention other crucial roles present in today’s digital product development landscape, such as UX/UI designers, user researchers, and other team members.

Lean-Scrum Approach

Lean-Scrum encourages teams to consider all activities performed by team members in achieving strategic objectives as whole team activities. These activities should be planned and delivered iteratively, and consequently, added to the team and sprint backlogs whenever possible. This emphasis on integrated work is crucial in Lean-Scrum to avoid the inefficiency caused by siloed roles within Scrum teams.

Daily Scrum Format

While the Scrum Guide doesn’t prescribe a specific format for the Daily Scrum, it’s commonly conducted using three questions:

What did I work on yesterday?
What am I working on today?
What obstacles are blocking me?

In Remote and Hybrid Working Environments

This format can be highly effective in co-located Agile environments where stand-up meetings might not be the only communication throughout the day. However, in remote working setups, this format may not provide enough insight into progress toward sprint goals. Additionally, less experienced practitioners and less Agile IT organizations might misuse this format as a “command and control” checkpoint.

Lean-Scrum Daily Stand-up Format

Instead of a kind of daily reporting format, Lean-Scrum encourages teams to review user stories and other product backlog items on a sprint Kanban board, including design, discovery, and value creation activities

Duration and Frequency

Duration: 15 minutes
Frequency: Daily (excluding the day of spring planning)

Objectives

Review progress on the sprint backlog toward sprint objectives
Identify blockers and risks
Receive updates from product management
Optional: Receive updates from other team roles who might not have specific backlog items on the board they are working on (e.g., Q/A, Business Analysts etc)