Read Notes from a “Scrum in Heat” Is really development in the Dark
Doug Seven at MS, describes a variation of on Scrum where they only get Customer feedback one sprint in three. This isn’t Scrum. Scrum relies on getting frequent feedback from the Product Owner (aka Customer). Teams should be able to consult with the Product Owner daily (at a minimum a couple of times a week). Why is this important? It stops us going to far off course. Its easier to (and cheaper) to make changes while the code is still fresh in our minds.
Finally a week long planning session seems suspiciously long – for a month long sprint you would normally expect about a four hour planning session (the norm is an hour per week of sprint). This much upfront planning/design iteration sounds more like waterfall than anything Agile.
Doug if you only get feedback once in three months how is this scrum? How is it even Agile of any form?
Update: Doug has replied on his blog, there is really a lot more going on than he stated in the original post. He really is doing Scrum with a bit of XP. I will let this post stand because my point about doing Scrum without a customer still stands.
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