The Purpose of the Sprint Review

Agile is a project management method with a systematic, iterative approach whose fundamental principle is continuous releases of products or services while incorporating customer feedback with every iteration. Agile teams are designed to respond quickly to dynamic market conditions, not only in the software industry and in every sector where changes are frequent.

One of the most widely used and successful frameworks that use the Agile methodology is Scrum. This methodology is based on the approach of breaking up the entire project’s life cycle into small and manageable bits of work and doing them in “Sprints.” The concept of Sprints is at the heart of Scrum and Agile methodologies. At the start of a complex project, it is divided into specific sets of Sprints. Each Sprint is a short, time-bound period when the Scrum Team works to complete one of these predefined work sets. Scrum is best implemented into projects where the environment whether market conditions or customer needs changes rapidly and can be addressed between one Sprint and the next.

For the Scrum framework to lead to successful project delivery, there should be communication and feedback. It is achieved with four distinct events. The Scrum events are four different types of Agile meetings and are represented below.

In this article, Let’s discuss one of the events, which is the Sprint Review.
 

What is the main purpose of a Sprint Review?
 

The simple answer to the question is: it’s an event for  stakeholders to scrutinise what’s been built and be involved in deciding what changes need to be incorporated,

The Sprint Review is a Scrum Event that is conducted after a Sprint is completed. This event is held to demonstrate the work completed during the Sprint, acknowledging the team’s efforts and seeking feedback from the stakeholders on the Sprint’s end-product.
 

Who are the participants?
 

The Sprint Review is not to be considered as merely a “Demo” for the customers. The team does unveil and demonstrate their accomplishment during the Sprint. But importantly, it is an opportunity for stakeholders to join forces and decide how to advance into the next iteration. The participants are:
 

Scrum Team
 

The Scrum Master and Developers have to be present since they are the ones who can explain what work was done.
 

Scrum Team
 

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Internal Stakeholders
 

These are the Product Owner or the customer representative, senior management, sales and marketing, perhaps people involved in different projects in the organization, and others keenly involved in seeing the project’s progress.
 

External Stakeholders
 

Especially with critical Sprints, The Product owner could invite external people to take part. For example, some of the largest retailers can be asked to have first-hand experience with the product and provide feedback before it is deployed.

The Sprint Review is an opportunity to showcase the current stage of the product’s development and allows questions and suggestions on what is to be done in the current environment.
 

What is done during a Sprint Review?
 

There are only two subjects that are covered during this meeting.
 

• Demonstrate the completed backlog tasks: Each team member of the team will describe the tasks that were completed during the Sprint, how it was achieved, and where they stand in the overall progress of the project.
   

Take feedback from the participants: The principle of the Scrum structure is to give all the stakeholders the chance to make their observations, offer suggestions, and request improvements. The Sprint Review is the right platform to gather all the feedback and make an attempt to incorporate it into the next Sprint.
 

Sprint Review Preparation Activities
 

These are the activities that have to be done before the Sprint Review meetings.
 

1.   Inviting the participants
    

As described earlier, the participants are the Developers along with the Scrum Master, Product Owner, and other Stakeholders. The Sprint Review is typically conducted on the final day of the Sprint. Most Sprints have a consistent duration of about two-three weeks, so it is a good idea to send out invitations sufficiently early. It may also be a good practice to conduct the event at a regular time of day so that the participants can mark off their calendars until the project is completed. This arrangement is particularly significant with global teams so that everybody can take part, if not physically, then through a video link.
 

2.   Update what’s completed
    

Confirmations that all the work has been completed should be up-to-date. This includes the work that is done on the day of the Sprint Review. It’s essential to give an accurate picture to all the stakeholders before the meeting is begun. In case some work could not be completed, it is better to be upfront about it.
 

3.   Preparing for the demonstration
    

Different members of the Scrum team should do the demonstration to encourage a sense of ownership and teamwork. Involving everyone into this process means it will require preparation on the sequence and the process to be followed.
 

Sprint Review Activities
 

Here are a few things to keep in mind while conducting the Sprint Review.
 

1. Celebrate the team’s achievement
   
   The Sprint Review is not an examination; it is an event to boost the team’s morale. Everyone involved should go into the Review event with a positive mindset.
    
2. Summarize the accomplishments
   
   Summary information should be presented so that all the participants are on the same page with respect to the goals vs. the achievements. The Product Owner could submit the Sprint Goal – whether the team needed to get a product ready for deployment or whether a specific feature or quality parameters had to be improved. The items in the backlog that are associated and their status should also be presented.
    
3. Demonstration
   
   In the next step, Developers should demonstrate what was done. Let’s suppose Developers are working on a mobile app, the participants can download and try out the latest version of the app that was worked on in the last Sprint. The team can also talk about the problems that came up and how they were resolved.
    
4. Discussion and Feedback
   
   After the demo, the key stakeholders are asked for their feedback on the work done. The Product Owner notes down the feedback usually, there will be suggestions for changes to be made to a Product Backlog item or tweaking the future Sprint approach. The entire group then considers and discusses what is to be done next. In discussions like these,Stakeholders, like the Marketing team, can make observations about how the product’s intended use might have changed based on market reality.
    
5. Conclusion
   
   Sprint Review meetings end with mutual understanding between all the participants about what the accomplishments have been so far and the priorities in the upcoming Sprints.
    

What are the Pros and Cons of a Sprint Review?
 

Pros:
 

• It helps to gather critically important feedback from stakeholders
• The feedback is received face-to-face, so there are fewer chances of misinterpretation
• There is transparency about the work completed and what is outstanding
• Information received can contribute to the success of subsequent Sprints
• It helps to enhance team motivation if conducted in a positive environment
   

Cons:
 

• If not planned correctly, Sprint Reviews can diverge into unconnected topics, which are not beneficial
• If the Sprint’s Goals are not clear to all the stakeholders, the feedback received may not be useful
   

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In Conclusion
 

Organizations that think a Sprint Review is a “Demo” session need to re-think what they are doing. If the participants are told it’s a product demonstration, that’s all they will come prepared for. When done the right way, the event goes a lot beyond just that and engages everyone in a collaborative process about what to do next.  

The focus shouldn’t be only on what is done well and can be validated. Scrum Teams must also be prepared and willing to talk about Product Backlog Items that weren’t achieved during the Sprint. By deliberately hiding this sort of information, systemic issues and constraints within the team don’t get cleared up. The result will be an unhappy team that cannot work to its best capacity. Additionally, stakeholders at all levels will not be aware of how much further effort has to be put in to achieve the project’s goals as a whole. They may leave with the impression that things are better than expected and have unrealistic expectations.

The solution for almost any problem in Scrum is open communication and valuing feedback. The purpose of a Sprint Review in any Agile environment should be to conduct it exactly how it was designed. Teams should do it both in letter and in Spirit.