Understanding Scrum Life Cycle and Framework in Software Engineering & its benefits

In the fast paced world of software engineering, the Scrum framework stands out as a powerful Agile methodology designed to promote teamwork, accountability and continuous improvement. Through a structured life cycle, Scrum helps development teams deliver high quality products in an iterative, time boxed approach. This article delves into the Scrum life cycle and framework, illustrating each stage and key roles with an easy to understand diagram. Whether you're new to Agile methodologies or looking to deepen your understanding, this guide offers a comprehensive overview of how Scrum benefits by driving efficiency and quality in software projects.

Agile Scrum methodology, with its Scrum framework, iterative phases, and collaborative approach, has become a widely adopted and effective methodology for managing projects and developing products in various industries. Its emphasis on customer satisfaction, transparency, and continuous improvement makes it a valuable choice for teams seeking to adapt and thrive in today's fast-paced and unpredictable business landscape. Agile Scrum methodology is widely used in various industries and projects including software development, product development, project management, research and development, marketing and sales etc.

What is Scrum?

The scrum is the framework for implementation of agile software product development/project management. It can also be applied to software maintenance projects. The idea behind scrum is to divide the project into as many milestones as possible so that deliverables in incremental phases can be demonstrated to the customer much early and hence feedback/problems/ issues can be known at the early stage of the project life cycle. This small period of incremental phases in the agile process is called sprint. Sprint period is typically about 1 to 4 weeks. Usually it is taken as 1 month i.e. 4 weeks. But if the project is very small it can be taken as 2 weeks to have more milestones in entire duration as well as to have first milestone occur little earlier.

Agile Scrum is an iterative and incremental approach to software development and project management. It emphasizes flexibility, adaptability, and customer collaboration throughout the development process. The methodology follows a framework called Scrum, which includes specific roles, processes, and ceremonies.

Principles behind Agile Scrum Methodology

• Customer satisfaction through early and continuous delivery of valuable software in incremental phases.
• Welcome change in requirements, even late in project. The same need to be mutually agreed upon by customer and agile team. In order to avoid problems at the end of each sprint at the start itself the tasks which have been derived from epic/user stories need to be communicated along with acceptance criteria to the customer.
• Deliver working software in phases frequently, with more milestones in entire duration of project.
• Create self organizing team by way of motivation and trust.
• Deliver software which passes definition of DONE.
• The stakeholders, team and end users should be able to maintain pace constantly i.e. their needs to be fulfilled or satisfied.
• Continuous attention to quality will enhance agility.

Scrum life cycle phases

The Scrum development life cycle follows an iterative and incremental approach. The team goes through repeated cycles of planning, executing sprints, reviewing progress, and adapting the process based on feedback.

The Scrum framework consists of the following key components. It includes Product Owner, Scrum Master, Development Team, Product Backlog and Sprint. The figure depicts scrum life cycle phases. Following steps or phases are followed in scrum based agile software development.

1. First the high level requirements are finalized based on end user perspective/opinions; hence it is called user stories. These user stories are broken up into tasks till we will not be able to break them down further. This is created in a document called as product backlog by Product Owner in association with customer. All the stories/ tasks are prioritized.

2. These tasks after prioritization are divided into sprints. Each sprint will contain set of tasks. This is done in sprint planning. The document created is called sprint backlog. The entire responsibility of sprint backlog lies with Scrum team.

3. Now the Sprint process will come in execution phase where in the scrum team will do mainly development/testing activities. During sprint execution phase scrum team daily meets to discuss the progress. These meetings are facilitated by scrum master. Hence scrum master plays the role of facilitator or servant leader. These meetings are called daily standup meetings or daily scrum meetings. These meetings are each of 15 minutes duration. In these meetings each team members will talk on three questions i.e. what they have achieved till yesterday, what they are going to do and are there any impediments on the way of smooth work progress.

4. After the end of sprint scrum team will do sprint review and also sprint retrospectives. This helps in better planning for next sprints.

5. After the sprint retrospectives the phase 1 or iteration 1 of the development carried out. It is evaluated with definition of DONE which is also called as acceptance criteria. Now the increment 1 of the development carried out will be demonstrated to the customer and feedback will be obtained from the customer. The same feedback will be utilized for next sprints.

6. The steps 1 to 5 mentioned above are revisited again in the consecutive sprints. Hence the scrum life cycle is a continuous process.

• Scrum team - It is composed of product owner, team members and scrum master as described above.
• Scrum artifacts - The product backlog, sprint backlog and burn down chart are scrum artifacts.
Product backlog- It is basically list of requirements including priorities and estimation of each requirements.
Sprint backlog- It is subset of product backlog items selected to be executed during each sprint. This include plan to deliver product increment also. As new work is required to be added, the development team or scrum team adds it to sprint backlog. As work is performed/completed estimation of remaining work is done and from it burndown chart is made.
Burn down chart- As mentioned the burn down chart plots remaining effort versus days. This gives estimation on when the work is going to be completed.
• Scrum Events/Ceremonies - Sprint planning, daily scrum meetings, sprint review and sprint retrospective are scrum ceremonies.
Sprint review- It is time boxed meeting to review work carried out in a sprint. It should be about 4 hour long.
- In this meeing Product Owner identifies what is done and what is not done.
- Development team discuss what went well, how issues resolved during the last sprint.
- Entire group decides on what to be done next.
• Sprint retrospective : It is also time boxed meeting for the sprint and done after sprint review meeting. It should be about 3 hour. The purpose of sprint retrospective is to create a plan to implement whether any improvement is required to the way last sprint went.

• The diagram below mentions scrum chart which is maintained by scrum team and updated by them. Scrum master may or may not be part of the daily scrum meetings.
• After the spring planning meetings we will get features and tasks in these features. The same is taken in 'planned' column. After this tasks are picked up voluntarily by scrum team which are moved from planned column to the 'being done' column. Once the task is completed it need to be moved to 'done' column. Every day burn down chart is updated which forecasts remaining effort over the next left over days. All the remaining tasks will be moved to the next sprint cycle. Usually sprint is about 3-4 weeks.
• If any issues are raised during the sprint by scrum team then they are listed in the unplanned section and will be taken care in the next sprint cycle after next sprint planning is done along with the product owner.

Definition of DONE

When some requirement from product backlog or sprint backlog is completed or DONE, the same need to be compared with acceptance criteria which is also called as 'definition of DONE'. This definition of DONE varies with product to product and it has to be finalized or agreed upon at the start of the project between customer and product owner.

scrum vs waterfall

The figure below compares scrum vs waterfall software development life cycle(SDLC). The idea behind agile environment is to perform concurrent activities of requirement, planning, Coding, testing, review, release (deploying) phases. These were carried out sequentially in waterfall model. Hence as shown in the figure in waterfall model problems/issues will be known much later. The idea behind agile way of managing project is to carry out above mentioned phases in each sprint multiple times as shown in figure. Hence in Agile Scrum Methodology, issues are known much earlier in the project and review is carried out so often within the sprint duration that helps a lot.

More over in waterfall model requirements need to be worked out in detail at the start of the project and there is no room to change or take new requirements in between project execution, While in scrum agile model new requirements can be taken up during execution of the project and will be worked upon and consecutively all the phases will be executed. In Waterfall one can have release after long time at the end of the project unless few milestones are planned by project manager, While in scrum agile model more releases of the product will be available compare to waterfall due to more sprint planning in the same duration as that of waterfall model.

Finally in waterfall model estimation of tasks is done in time (Man hours,days,weeks or months) while in agile scrum it is done in story points. Each iteration is called as phase in waterfall while in agile scrun it is called as sprint as mentioned earlier.

Benefits of Scrum Framework

1. Enhanced Collaboration and Communication : Scrum promotes regular communication and collaboration among team members through daily stand-ups, sprint planning, and review meetings. This fosters a transparent environment, helping teams address issues quickly and stay aligned on project goals.
2. Faster Delivery of Value : Scrum’s iterative approach breaks down complex projects into smaller, manageable sprints, enabling teams to deliver incremental improvements faster. This allows stakeholders to see progress regularly and gain early value from software features.
3. Flexibility and Adaptability : The Scrum framework is highly adaptable to changing requirements. Teams can easily pivot in response to feedback, new priorities, or market shifts, ensuring that the final product aligns closely with user needs and business objectives.
4. Continuous Improvement : Scrum’s focus on retrospectives and feedback encourages teams to assess and refine their processes after every sprint. This promotes a culture of continuous improvement, leading to better performance and quality over time.
5. Increased Customer Satisfaction : By involving stakeholders in each sprint review and delivering functional increments consistently, Scrum ensures that customer expectations are met or exceeded. This fosters higher levels of satisfaction and stronger client relationships.

Conclusion

The Scrum life cycle and framework bring structure and agility to software engineering projects, enabling teams to respond quickly to changing requirements and deliver value incrementally. By understanding and implementing each stage, supported by clear roles and processes, teams can enhance collaboration and drive meaningful results. As Scrum continues to evolve, its core principles remain central to building adaptive, high quality software in a rapidly changing digital world.

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