I've been working in bank tech for 25 years and this pattern just keeps repeating everywhere I go.
Team sits down for sprint planning. Takes forever. Probably 4 hours by the time we're done arguing about story points and breaking shit down and mapping who needs what from who.
Everyone leaves knowing what they're doing for two weeks. Board looks great. All organized.
Couple days later something breaks. Or priorities shift. Or we find out another team needed something we didn't know about. Plan falls apart.
Next sprint? Same thing. Four hours. New plan. Dies in a few days.
Tracked this once because it was making me insane. Out of 20 sprints maybe 3 actually ended close to what we planned at the start. The rest just completely different by the end.
So what are we even doing? It's not planning if nothing survives. More like... I don't know. Making management feel better? Having something to point at?
Teams I saw shipping well never did this. They'd just grab what looked important and start. Things changed? Cool, adjust. Keep moving.
Anyway. Been watching this happen for years and nobody ever questions it. Starting to wonder if it's just me or if everyone knows this is bullshit but we all just go along with it anyway.
Yes, in my experience sprints almost always go according to plan. But that is because if the team cannot successfully run a Scrum process, then they don't. Trying to force sprints and scrum onto a team that cannot or will not do it is the true failure. After all, Scrum in general has warts. So if you aren't succeeding with it, switch to something else. Do Kanban. Do Waterfall. Invent your own thing. But if your process doesn't work, don't keep doing it.
I've been working in bank tech for 25 years and this pattern just keeps repeating everywhere I go.
Team sits down for sprint planning. Takes forever. Probably 4 hours by the time we're done arguing about story points and breaking shit down and mapping who needs what from who.
Everyone leaves knowing what they're doing for two weeks. Board looks great. All organized.
Couple days later something breaks. Or priorities shift. Or we find out another team needed something we didn't know about. Plan falls apart.
Next sprint? Same thing. Four hours. New plan. Dies in a few days.
Tracked this once because it was making me insane. Out of 20 sprints maybe 3 actually ended close to what we planned at the start. The rest just completely different by the end.
So what are we even doing? It's not planning if nothing survives. More like... I don't know. Making management feel better? Having something to point at?
Teams I saw shipping well never did this. They'd just grab what looked important and start. Things changed? Cool, adjust. Keep moving.
Anyway. Been watching this happen for years and nobody ever questions it. Starting to wonder if it's just me or if everyone knows this is bullshit but we all just go along with it anyway.
Your sprints actually go according to plan?
Yes, in my experience sprints almost always go according to plan. But that is because if the team cannot successfully run a Scrum process, then they don't. Trying to force sprints and scrum onto a team that cannot or will not do it is the true failure. After all, Scrum in general has warts. So if you aren't succeeding with it, switch to something else. Do Kanban. Do Waterfall. Invent your own thing. But if your process doesn't work, don't keep doing it.