Agile Fundamentals: Including Scrum & Kanban

It is great to virtually meet you!

In this lecture, we provide you links to several critical items including a tour of Udemy's features, frequently asked questions, and more.

In this lecture, we provide you a ZIP file that contains all of the downloadable resources for the course. While those downloads are still available on appropriate lectures throughout the course, we're providing this ZIP file for convenience and to avoid some of the nuances and issues with downloading the files individually. It is our recommendation that you download this file now and then pull up the files as they are referenced within the course. Happy learning!

To start off the course, we explain the origins of Agile and gain an understanding of what Agile is all about.

Terms: Agile, Agile Manifesto, agile mindset

As some students like to learn at a faster pace, while others prefer slower, this lecture includes some simple instructions to adjust the playback rate of the course.

In this lecture, we discuss the four main Agile Values as described in the Agile Manifesto.

Terms: Agile Manifesto, agile values, stakeholder, agile mindset

This is a fun activity to get you familiar with some of the Agile terms that you will hear repeatedly throughout the course.

In this lecture, we break down the twelve Agile Principles as described in the Agile Manifesto and we provide our insight as to what makes the principles so important and how they can be applied to your projects.

Terms: Agile principles, self-organizing

Here we introduce you to some resources that you can download and print off to use a reference or study guide on the twelve Agile principles.

In this activity, we challenge you to come up with your top 5 Agile principles are and share them and your reasoning with Jeremy, Vivek, and the other students of the course.

Here Jeremy works through his top 5 Agile principles and gives you his thoughts.

Here Vivek works through his top 5 Agile principles and gives you his thoughts.

Now that we've covered some of the important aspects of the Agile Manifesto, it is time we take a step back and talk about some of the benefits of using Agile over other more traditional project approaches.

Terms: Waterfall, agile

As with any project approach, there are challenges that come out of using it. In this lecture, we explore some of those challenges so we can understand why not all companies have switched over to using Agile.

Terms: Agile, agile mindset

This lecture helps us transition from talking about Agile in general to talking about various project frameworks that have Agile at their center.

Terms: Agile, scrum, kanban, scrumban

Scrum is the most popular Agile framework, so that is where we will start. In this lecture, you will learn about Scrum's terminology, ceremonies, and artifacts.

Terms: Scrum, product backlog, sprint backlog, sprint planning, retrospective, sprint review, daily standup, sprint, cross-functional, self-organizing, inspection, adaption, transparency

Scrum is built around five core values. In this lecture, we will explore and explain those values and why they are important.

Terms: Scrum values, openness, focus, courage, commitment, respect

Within Scrum, there are three main prescribed roles - Scrum Master, Product Owner, Development team. In this lecture, we explore these roles and discuss their core responsibilities.

Terms: Product owner, scrum master, development team, user story, product increment

In this lecture, we further explore the responsibilities of a Scrum Master, and Vivek discusses his recent experience in the Scrum Master role.

Terms: Scrum master, sprint, daily standup, sprint review, sprint retrospective

The role of the Product Owner is very important to explore and understand the vision of the business and then deliver that vision to the strategists (the Development Team) who can make it come to reality.

Terms: Product owner, user story, MVP, scrum master

The Development Team is a cluster of all of the other folks on the project team besides the Scrum Master and Product Owner. This includes Business Analysts, Quality Analysts, Developers, Architects, etc.

Terms: Development team, business analyst, developer, product owner

Backlog Refinement is where the team ensures the user stories in the Product Backlog are accurate and contain enough details for them to be worked. When they find high-priority stories that don't have enough details, the team works to get those details identified and added to the story.

Terms: Backlog grooming, backlog refinement, sprint, sprint backlog, product backlog

All of these ceremonies are great, but sometimes they can be confusing until they are put into context. In this lecture, we walk through some examples of what your calendar could look like if your project had a one-week Sprint versus the two-week variety.

Terms: Sprint, sprint planning, daily standup, backlog refinement, backlog grooming, sprint review, sprint retrospective, user story

This lecture kicks off our section on Scrum Terms and Artifacts and where better to start, User Stories. Come explore what User Stories are and why they are used.

Terms: user story, product increment

One important aspect to gain more details about the User Story is Acceptance Criteria. In this lecture, we will explore what Acceptance Criteria are and how they can be used to bring additional value to your requirements.

Terms: acceptance criteria, user story

Great User Stories follow the INVEST principle. In this lecture, we will break down the acronym INVEST and teach you what it is important.

Terms: INVEST, user story

Attached to this lecture is a downloadable resource to give you some examples of how User Stories and their Acceptance Criteria could appear in projects.

Terms: user story, acceptance criteria, wireframe

The Product Backlog and the Sprint Backlog are two key artifacts within Agile Scrum. In this lecture, we explain how they are used to help understand the work yet to be done, as well as the stories that are committed to within this iteration.

Terms: product backlog, sprint backlog, sprint planning, priority, sprint

Projects are multiplayer games, so it is important to have an agreement on rules, expectations, and procedures that govern the team. And those are handled by Working Agreements, which we will discuss within this lecture.

Terms: working agreement

In this lecture, you will learn about how the Definition of Ready (DoR) helps the team to understand when a User Story contains enough details to be worked.

Terms: Definition of ready, working agreement, user story

The Definition of Done (DoD) is an agreement that ensures the team has a clear understanding of when a User Story can be considered done or complete. In this lecture, we explore the document and understand what having a common understanding of done is so important.

Terms: Definition of Done, user story, acceptance criteria

In this lecture, Vivek and Jeremy sit down and discuss the Definition of Ready and the Definition of Done to help bring some context to the artifacts.

Terms: definition of ready, definition of done

In this lecture, you'll learn about how Product Increments are used in Agile Scrum to help deliver value after each iteration.

Terms: Product increment, Scrum, Waterfall

In this lecture, we explain the concept of estimating and how teams come up with their estimates.

Terms: agile, estimate

Now that you understand what estimating is, let's compare the difference between estimating in a Traditional project versus those done in Agile.

Terms: agile, estimate, agile, waterfall

This lecture explores why estimating is important, regardless of the project approach that you are using.

Terms: agile, estimate

While there are quite a few different estimation techniques that can be used within projects, we explore three of the most popular. (part 1 of 2)

Terms: estimate, BUS, t-shirt sizes

While there are quite a few different estimation techniques that can be used within projects, we explore three of the most popular. (part 2 of 2)

Terms: estimate, fibonacci

Even though Agile only really recognizes three main roles, there are other roles that are equally as important to understand. In this lecture, we will explore those roles at a high level and then dig further into them throughout the remainder of the section.

Terms: Product owner, development team, scrum master, project sponsor, SME, technology leaders, business leaders, business users

The Project Sponsor is the person who has approved the project and is often putting forth the funding/budget to be used to pay for it. In this lecture, we dig more into the Project Sponsor role.

Terms: Project sponsor, sprint review

Business Leaders also play an important role in every Agile project. In this lecture, we will dig into how they provide value and how value is provided back to them.

Terms: Business leaders, sprint review

While the Technology Leaders aren't often engaged directly in projects, they are important in driving the project's success. In this lecture, we will dig more into the Technology Leaders role.

Terms: Technology leaders, sprint review, organizational standards

While effective leadership can bring significant value to projects, ineffective leadership can unravel even the most successful teams. In this lecture, we will explore some of the most common leadership detractors that often hinder and derail otherwise successful projects.

Terms: Agile mindset

Those senior users that are the go-to people when there are questions with that process or software are often called Subject Matter Experts. Come learn more about their role and how they provide value to your projects.

Terms: SME, sprint review

As most projects are created to drive value and efficiencies to the Business Users, let's dig into their project roles a bit deeper.

Terms: Business user

Often times, when organizations are trying to implement Agile, they use an Agile Coach. In this lecture, we explore the reasons how an Agile Coach can bring value to the project and the company.

Terms; Agile coach, agile values

In this lecture, we discuss how these other Agile roles can be utilized in all Agile approaches, not just those that follow Scrum.

Terms: Agile, Project Sponsor, Product Owner, Scrum

Team Velocity is an important element in Agile projects as it gives an idea of how much work a team can complete in each iteration. In this lecture, we will explore Team Velocity in more detail.

Terms: Team velocity, story point, product backlog, sprint backlog, sprint, estimate, Fibonacci, scrum

Burndown charts visually show work being completed in comparison to work that still needs to be done. By creating this visual diagram, you can more easily see how the team's work is trending and if they are on target with goals that may have been set for an expected number of sprints or an MVP launch.

Terms: Burndown chart, sprint, scrum, estimate, story point

A Burn Up chart is similar to a burndown chart, but instead of counting down to the end of the project, it counts up to complete the number of story points. This allows it to better show the amount of work added or removed from the full project. In this lecture, we will further explain the Burn Up chart and show you a real-world example comparison to the Burndown chart.

Terms: burn up chart, burndown chart, sprint, user story, estimate, story point

While our examples in the Burndown and Burn Up charts are being shown with the Fibonacci estimations, this lecture will help explain how they can also be used if you are using a different estimation technique.

Terms: Fibonacci, burndown charts, burn up charts, story point, user story

Now that you understand what the burndown and burn up charts are and how they are used, it is time to understand who usually creates them.

Terms: Scrum master, burndown charts, burn up charts, user story

In this lecture, we will review the Scrum Terms Worksheet you completed in the previous lecture.