Backlog Grooming

What is the definition of Backlog Grooming? Backlog grooming, also referred to as backlog refinement or story time, is a recurring event for agile product development teams. The primary purpose of a backlog grooming session is to ensure the next few sprints worth of user stories in the product backlog are prepared for sprint planning. […]

Scaled Agile Framework

What is the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe)? The Scaled Agile Framework, or SAFe, is an agile framework developed for development teams. Most importantly, SAFE’s foundation consists of three metaphorical pillars: Team, Program, and Portfolio. Furthermore, SAFe gives a product team flexibility. Moreover, it helps manage some of the challenges larger organizations have when practicing Agile. […]

Product Development Cycle

What Is the Product Development Cycle? The product development cycle is the process of taking a product from an idea through its market release and beyond. This cycle involves many departments in a company: product managers, developers, designers, QA testers, and others. What Are the Product Development Cycle Stages? There is no universal definition of […]

Product Backlog

What is the Product Backlog? Definition: A product backlog lists and prioritizes the task-level details required to execute the strategic plan set forth in the roadmap. The backlog should communicate what’s next on the development team’s to-do list as they execute on the roadmap’s big-picture vision. Typical items in a product backlog include user stories, […]

Dual-Track Agile

What is Dual-Track Agile? The definition of dual-track agile is a type of agile development in which the cross-functional product team breaks its daily development work into two tracks: discovery and delivery. The discovery track focuses on quickly generating validated product ideas for the backlog, and the delivery track focuses on turning those ideas into […]

Definition of Done

What Does the ‘Definition of Done’ Mean? In the Scrum agile framework, the Definition of Done describes the list of requirements that the team agrees must be met to consider a user story or other backlog item complete. The specific criteria will vary by team, but a typical agile team’s checklist for Definition of Done […]

Story Point

What is a Story Point? A story point is a unit of measurement used by development teams to estimate the amount of effort required to execute an item in the backlog. Since not all developers work at the same pace, this measurement system helps create a standardized language that is universally understood across the team.

Disciplined Agile (DA)

What is Disciplined Agile? Disciplined Agile (DA), is a process decision framework that puts individuals first and offers only lightweight guidance to help teams optimize their processes according to the unique needs of each specific project. As a people-first agile framework, DA is in some ways similar to the Crystal method. In fact, DA is […]

Iteration

What is Iteration? In agile software development, an iteration is a set amount of time reserved for development. Typical iterations last 1-2 weeks, however, some may go as long as 4 weeks. Most agile development teams agree on the length of their iterations and proceed to operate on an iteration-by-iteration basis.

Agile Transformation

What is Agile Transformation? Agile transformation is the process of transitioning an entire organization to a nimble, reactive approach based on agile principles. Understanding agile transformation begins with understanding what it is not: adopting agile software development methodologies. While any organization undergoing this transformation is likely to also embrace agile, Scrum, Lean, etc., agile transformation […]