Project Management & Agile Module 8
Scrum by the 2020 Scrum Guide interview questions
Interview questions on scrum by the 2020 Scrum Guide: short warm-ups, then what each harder question tests, the first step of a good answer and its follow-ups.
Warm-up questions
Short questions with short answers, each answered in full.
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Fresher to mid
Why is Scrum founded on empiricism rather than a detailed up-front plan?
Because Scrum is used for complex work, where the requirements and the best method are not fully known at the start, so a detailed plan written up front only encodes guesses. Empiricism makes decisions from what has actually been observed: build a small slice, inspect it against the goal, and decide the next slice from the evidence. Lean thinking adds the discipline of cutting work that creates no value. The practical gain is risk control, because a wrong assumption surfaces within one Sprint instead of at a gate near the end, where it is dear to undo. The bus-pass team learned only by shipping a slice that each pass needed its own receipt, not one per family.
From the lesson Scrum theory, values and accountabilities
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Fresher to mid
Who is accountable for what on a Scrum Team, and where is the project manager?
Answered in the lesson Scrum theory, values and accountabilities
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Fresher to mid
In Scrum, is a timebox a target or a maximum?
A maximum. For a one-month Sprint the Guide allows at most eight hours for Sprint Planning, four for the Sprint Review and three for the Sprint Retrospective, and says shorter Sprints usually have shorter events; the Daily Scrum is a 15-minute event at any Sprint length. An event that reaches its outcome sooner stops, so a Retrospective that agrees its change in 40 of its 90 minutes is over. The Sprint itself is the exception: it is fixed length rather than "up to" a length, because a cadence that stretches cannot be compared from one Sprint to the next.
From the lesson The Sprint and the four Scrum events
Questions with model answers
What each question tests, the first step of a good answer and the follow-ups to expect.
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Mid to senior
A team's task board shows most items "done", yet every Sprint Review surprises stakeholders with work that is missing or half-built. Using the three pillars, diagnose what has gone wrong and say how you would fix it.
- What it tests
- Tracing the failure to transparency first, then its effect on inspection and adaptation, and fixing a shared Definition of Done rather than the board tool.
- First step
- Compare a few "done" items against the Definition of Done. If there is none, or the board marks items done before they meet it, the board is not transparent, so every inspection built on it, including the Review, is misleading.
- Follow-ups
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- What if the team has no written Definition of Done at all?
- Someone insists the board is accurate. How do you check in minutes?
- How do you stop this recurring after one good Sprint?
From the lesson Scrum theory, values and accountabilities
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In the answer:
- Model answer
- Follow-up answers
- Common mistakes
- Rubric
- Variants
- about 3 minutes
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Mid to staff
You join a fifteen-person "Scrum team" with a separate "Development Team" under a lead who assigns tasks and decides when work is done. Leadership wants it to follow the 2020 Scrum Guide. What do you change, and in what order?
- What it tests
- Recognising this is not one Scrum Team, splitting into teams of ten or fewer on the same product, moving to accountabilities and self-management, and sequencing the change without stalling delivery.
- First step
- Name the gap: the Guide has one Scrum Team of ten or fewer, no sub-teams, and no one assigning work. Fifteen people under a task-assigning lead is two or three Scrum Teams waiting to form, each on the same Product Goal, backlog and Product Owner.
- Follow-ups
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- How many teams would you form from fifteen people, and on what basis?
- What happens to the lead who assigned tasks and decided when work was done?
- How do you keep delivery going during the change?
From the lesson Scrum theory, values and accountabilities
Model answer, Pro.In the answer:
- Model answer
- Follow-up answers
- Common mistakes
- Rubric
- Variants
- about 3 minutes
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Mid to senior
A team's Sprint Planning uses its whole four-hour timebox, ends with 14 selected items and no Sprint Goal, and the Developers say the goal will be obvious once they start. The Sprint begins tomorrow. What do you do, and what do you change next time?
- What it tests
- Whether the candidate can rescue a Sprint without a goal, tell a goal from a list of work, and change the facilitation rather than the people.
- First step
- Before the Sprint starts, ask whether anyone can say in one sentence what should be different for a user when it ends. If nobody can, that missing sentence is the first problem to solve, ahead of the list of items.
- Follow-ups
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- How do you tell a Sprint Goal from a list of selected items?
- What do you do with items that do not serve the goal?
- The Developers say a goal limits them. How do you answer?
- What would you change in the next Sprint Planning itself?
From the lesson The Sprint and the four Scrum events
Model answer, Pro.In the answer:
- Model answer
- Follow-up answers
- Common mistakes
- Rubric
- Variants
- about 4 minutes
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Fresher to senior
A six-person team's Daily Scrum runs 25 minutes. Each Developer reports to the project manager in turn, two people debug a problem while the rest wait, and the plan for the day never changes. How do you fix the event?
- What it tests
- Reading the purpose of the Daily Scrum against what the event actually produces, and repairing it without taking it over.
- First step
- Ask what the event produced yesterday. If nobody can name a change to the plan, the problem is what the event produces, not how long it runs.
- Follow-ups
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- Who should attend, and what about the Product Owner?
- The team says 15 minutes is not enough. What do you check?
- Where do the detailed discussions go instead?
- How would you know in two weeks whether the fix worked?
From the lesson The Sprint and the four Scrum events
Model answer, Pro.In the answer:
- Model answer
- Follow-up answers
- Common mistakes
- Rubric
- Variants
- about 4 minutes
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Mid to staff
Your team works from Pune (10:00 to 18:30) and Berlin (09:00 to 17:30). After Europe's clock change the Daily Scrum, booked at a fixed Pune time, falls before the two Berlin Developers' day starts, and Sprint Planning takes four hours. How do you rebuild the event calendar?
- What it tests
- Working out the shared hours of two local working days in both seasons, pricing a badly placed event, and writing rules that survive both seasons.
- First step
- Put both working days on one clock for each season and mark where they overlap. Check which events fit in each season before you move anything.
- Follow-ups
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- How do you price the cost of the badly placed slot?
- Would you split the Daily Scrum into two, one per site?
- Sprint Planning needs most of the shared hours. What do you do?
- What do you write down so this does not come back?
From the lesson The Sprint and the four Scrum events
Model answer, Pro.In the answer:
- Model answer
- Follow-up answers
- Common mistakes
- Rubric
- Variants
- about 4 minutes
All Project Management & Agile interview questions · The Project Management & Agile track