How to overcome from Scrum challenges?

Challenge 1: Team members are not adapted to Scrum to make estimate.

At the grooming session involve with team and work along with them to convert epic in user story and break user story into task.

Use Planning Poker or T-Shirt Size estimation technique to create estimate and involve them.

So they see what the solution could be and how many effort it needs.

Challenge 2: The user stories are too big and not detailed enough.

Release planning is the time entire scrum team work with product owner to discuss on the Epic to create user stories.

Need to perform backlog grooming with Product Owner and Business Analyst during the sprint planning meeting to break user stories into small and doable.

Challenge 3:  Almost all user stories are in progress till the last day of sprint.

The first thump rule is the user stories with in the sprints should not depend on each other.

Break user stories in to tasks which should be doable in a day.

If you are using two week sprint follow 8 working day for development, 1 day for QA and 1 day for bug-fix and release.

Challenge 4:  Lot of quality issues.

Implement Pair Programming (development technique in which two programmers work together at one workstation) with one junior who write the code and one senior who is the observer or navigator, reviews each line of code as it is typed in. Make sure this is followed in testing the user story also.

Challenge 5:  Are the team aware of the issues we are facing?

People will usually not self-organize just because you tell them to. They need help/coaching from you.

Conduct Sprint Retrospective meeting, this meeting is the core engine of team to understand the problems/issues we are facing and come up with continuous improvement ideas.

This is dedicated time for the team to analyze their own performance and decide which practices to keep, change or abandon.

Challenge 6:  Lack of Agile Training.

Agile concepts are easy to grasp but difficult to follow.

If the team is not well versed in Agile, as a coach and mentor you will have to train them and get them up to speed with what Scrum is all about. 

Challenge 7:  Managing Changes in Scope.

The scrum team is getting work from Product Owner, it is actually the Product Owner’s responsibility to manage the scope and direction of the work.

As a scrum master you need to work with Product Owner to revise the Sprit Plan based on the change in the scope and give clarity to the team members.

Challenge 8:  Skipping Meetings.

Agile meetings are an important part of the framework, and need to be conducted the way in which they are laid out in the rule books.  If meetings are skipped, or postponed due to emergent work, then the advantages of transparency, inspection and adaptation will be lost. 

The Scrum Master should be firm about holding the meetings on time, and ensuring that they maintain focus and do not overshoot the pre-set duration.

Challenge 9:  Working on Multiple Teams.

In companies that employ part-time Scrum Masters (Project Mangers are playing Scrum Master role), or require one Scrum Master to work on several teams at the same time, the Agile team loses the dedicated support and accessibility to the Scrum Master.

In such cases, the Scrum Master is unable to motivate and maximize the full potential of the team. 

If you are a part-time Scrum Master who is stretched and needs more time to work with the Scrum team, ask for full time employment. Or, instead of working on multiple teams, shift most of your time to serving one team, and have a temporary Scrum Master on the other team who can take over your tasks when you have no time.

Challenge 10:  Managing distributed agile teams.

Ensure proper visibility of the project status.

Measure your team's productivity.

Invest in tools for better communication & collaboration. (JIRA)

Distributing work.

Keep a check on code quality.

Virtual meeting and collaboration.

Group chat.

Building self-sufficient team.

inter-team meetings.

Challenge 11:  Unhealthy Relationship with the Product Owner.

The Scrum Master and Product Owner are supposed to be two sides of a coin who work together for the common benefit of all.

Very often, though, they have personalities that clash, and there is a breakdown of communication that affects the progress of work.

Even if there are small conflicts, the Scrum Master and Product Owner must work together to resolve them before they escalate into a full blown misunderstanding.

A supportive relationship with plenty of give and take is necessary for the health of the team as a whole.