I made the changes to the product backlog because < < enter response that explains your changes
Question:
I made the changes to the product backlog because << enter response that explains your changes referencing all relevant details from the case study>>
I selected the specific items I chose for the sprint 2 backlog because << enter response that explains your choices referencing all relevant details from the case study>>
At the end of sprint 2, I recommend that the PO decision to release the site should be [go/no-go]. For the following reasons: <>
Case Study
Wisconsin weather has become surprisingly unpredictable and volatile in the last few years. In the past year alone, some areas of Wisconsin had experienced unusually heavy rainfall (resulting in severe flooding), life threatening wind chill temperatures, heavy snowfalls, high winds and other extreme weather. During these times, often local business - including restaurants - would close. This made it difficult for company workers to find places to order lunch during the day. Local inhabitants and some off campus college students also found themselves facing a lack of food or shopping options. Particularly for these types of residents, transportation in inclement weather could be an issue, since many walked or biked to their destinations.
During a particularly long stretch of dangerous wind chill weather, a group of young entrepreneurs attending a workshop wanted to go out for lunch. After walking to two restaurants that were close by (in -35 degree wind chill weather!), they returned to the workshop without lunch because both restaurants were closed due to the weather. Irritable and hungry, the group members thought of the idea to have a local resource available to help people find businesses that would be open during extreme weather emergencies. They quickly formed a small startup company and Scrum team to create an online system for this purpose. Their vision was for this online system to initially provide information only to attract site visitors and awareness, which would ultimately lead to potential revenue to be generated through ads, business sign ups, and other marketing and promotional services.
Product Backlog After evaluating the weather reports for the upcoming month, then looking back over the past two years, the team decided it would be worthwhile to produce such a system. They agreed to identify the initial priorities for the system based on the local college population (living off campus, without meal plans) and downtown area (young professionals living in the area and/or at work), since those potential customers were most likely to eat out often and to be looking for last minute dining options during inclement weather.
The Product Owner (PO) came up with the following Product Backlog for the project. After meeting with the ScrumMaster (SM) and Development Team (DT) members, the project team decided that this system could be fully developed within 2 months, to be broken into four (4) two-week sprints, working Monday - Friday.
Item | Size | |
1. | As a restaurant owner, I want to be able to add my information prominently so that potential customers know my restaurant is open before they look at other options. | 3 |
2. | As a diner, I want to view a list of all restaurants within my specified radius, so I can see all the options I have for finding food. | 5 |
3. | As a system administrator, I want an easy way to update restaurant information on the site, so that I don't have to rely on technical support every time I need to make a change. | 2 |
4. | As a diner, I want the information to be accessible via mobile device, so that I can look up information on the go. | 3 |
5. | As a diner, I want to be able to view restaurants by category - i.e., type of cuisine - to see if the specific type of food I want has any restaurants open. | 2 |
6. | As a diner, I want to view the menus of each restaurant, so I can decide what food I want before contacting the restaurant directly. | 1 |
7. | As a diner, I want to get directions to the restaurant, so I know how to get there via the transportation mode(s) I have available. | 2 |
8. | As a diner, I want to be able to order online so that I can still order if I am not able to call. (low) | 3 |
9. | As a diner, I want to know whether the restaurant delivers, in case it's not possible for me to go get the food. | 1 |
10. | As a diner, I want to be able to sign up for alerts so I can stay aware of new restaurants or information. | 3 |
11. | As a restaurant owner, I want to be able to display promotions to customers so they will be more likely to choose my restaurant. | 8 |
12. | As a restaurant owner, I want to be able to sign up for alerts so that I know when my competitors are open. | 3 |
Despite agreeing to a reasonable timeline to complete the project in two months, the PO encouraged the development team to complete the project sooner, before someone else came up with the idea. The DT thought this would be a pretty straightforward effort, so they decided to be very ambitious when planning the first sprint. This team has worked together before, was very cohesive, and felt confident about the work they needed to do. They estimated that the team could deliver 12 points for the sprint. If they were successful in attaining this target velocity, they would be able to deliver the full system in approximately three sprints instead of four. Based on the PO's prioritization and the team's capabilities, the DT agreed to the following sprint backlog for the first sprint of the project. Total points for this backlog totaled 14 - 5 points higher than the target velocity - so the team negotiated with the product owner to set the initial radius for PBI #2 to 10 miles, reducing its total points from 5 to 3, then they would expand the search radius in a later sprint to a larger geographic area and eventually allow the user to set the target radius.
Sprint Backlog
Item | Relative Size | Tasks | Actual Size | |
4 | As a diner, I want the information to be accessible via mobile device, so that I can look up information on the go. | 3 | Develop site designs for web, tablet and mobile interfaces - 6 hours Determine a mobile friendly site layout template to apply for site layout - 3 hours Develop image sizes and backgrounds for multiple display sizes - 5 hours Develop testing plan for site viewing on multiple devices - 4 hours Develop tracking data to identify types of devices accessing the site - 1 hour | 19 hours |
3 | As a system administrator, I want an easy way to update restaurant information on the site, so that I don't have to rely on technical support every time I need to make a change. | 2 | Evaluate options for site updates (i.e., user form, content management system, etc.) - 6 hours Choose a system to use for future site maintenance - 2 hours Develop site update instructions - 2 hours Test making site updates - 3 hours | 13 hours |
2 | As a diner, I want to view a list of all restaurants within my specified radius, so I can see all the options I have for finding food. note: this would be auto-set to 10 miles for this sprint) | 5 (3 to be delivered during this sprint) | Identify sources for restaurant data within 10 miles - 4 hours Gather restaurant data and/or develop a way to import restaurant data from another source - 4 hours Build search functionality for site - 8 hours Build surrounding site pages - 8 hours Test site functionality - 4 hours | 28 hours |
6 | As a diner, I want to view the menus of each restaurant, so I can decide what food I want before contacting the restaurant directly. | 1 | Determine best way to provide restaurant menu information - 2 hours Gather restaurant menu information - 4 hours Add restaurant menu information to site - 2 hours | 8 hours |
1 | As a restaurant owner, I want to be able to add my information prominently so that potential customers know my restaurant is open before they look at other options. | 3 | Develop priority ranking algorithm - 8 hours Build feature to allow owners to update information on a temporary basis - 8 hours Implement processes to validate data accuracy - 3 hours | 19 hours |
. |
During sprint 1, the PO continued to identify requirements for the system. She realized if they wanted to potentially earn revenue from subscribing restaurants, they would need a way to track how many visitors came to the system so the restaurants would know how much marketing potential they had. So, she needed to add a story to capture this need. She also needed to reprioritize some of the user stories, so that a working site could be available and marketed to customers to quickly start gathering data on number of site visits and customer subscriptions. Once they had enough of this data, they could start soliciting restaurants to sign up to offer promotions and listing priority. As the PO started reviewing the Product Backlog, she realized that having the user stories organized by priority would make it easier for her to distinguish between high and low priorities at a glance. So, she also needed to rearrange the stories in the product backlog for easier grooming.
Meanwhile, the DT realized they had been too ambitious when planning the first sprint. By the end of the sprint, they realized that a more realistic target velocity was 8, rather than 12. So, by the end of the sprint, 3 points of outstanding work remained incomplete.
Unfortunately, since they were only tracking work with a scrum board, they didn't realize how far they were behind schedule until the last few days of the sprint. TheirSprint 1 Task BoardLinks to an external site.showed the status of complete and incomplete tasks (screenshot below). The SM decided that he would monitor tasks much more closely for this second sprint by tracking the work with a burndown chart in addition to a scrum board.
Just as the team was ready to start on Sprint 2, weather forecasters predicted more extreme weather would be expected to hit areas of Wisconsin soon. This provided an excellent opportunity to test the site right away, but also meant the PO would need to decide whether to release a partially functional version of the site at the end of sprint 2, instead of waiting until the site was finished (make either a "go" or a "no go" decision to launch). If she decided to launch the site, she would also need to decide whether to pause the project after releasing the site to gather customer data before continuing, or to continue working on the remaining stories while gathering customer data and incorporate the changes as they go (as long as it would fit within the remaining number of sprints).
Income Tax Fundamentals 2013
ISBN: 9781285586618
31st Edition
Authors: Gerald E. Whittenburg, Martha Altus Buller, Steven L Gill