How I use Scrum in Personal Development

How I use Scrum in Personal Development

Deal with yourself as a project

Introduction

Hello, everyone. I am Ahmed Moustafa, a recent graduate of Zagazig University's Computer and Systems Engineering Department. I attempted several techniques to work and learn different things over my five years at college. I went from being erratic and cranky to being disciplined. I employed a variety of tools and tactics to combat distracting factors. Not to mention the occasions when I was exhausted.

I was on the riverbank once, under a blue sky and a tranquil sun, thinking about my personal life, remembering that I used to deal with a scrum on a daily basis. I spoke to myself and considered how to use the same processes in self-development at the technical level as a software engineer as well as at the non-technical level and gained abilities.

In this article, I will first define scrum and the techniques that it employs in general. Then I'll describe what I did on a personal level, and finally, I'll show you the outcomes I got.

What is Scrum?

scrum Illustration from agilearena [1]

Scrum – The Agile Framework

Scrum is a framework that facilitates teamwork. Scrum encourages teams to learn via experiences, self-organize while working on a problem, and reflect on their victories and losses to continually improve [2].

A Scrum project often begins with a vision of the product or system to be created. The vision may be hazy at first, and it is almost certainly based on commercial difficulties rather than technical concepts. It will become evident as the project progresses. The Product Owner is creating the Product Backlog based on this Vision [3].

Scrum Roles

Scrum methodology has 3 main roles:

  • Product Owner
  • Team
  • Scrum Master

All project management tasks are shared among these three roles.

Product Owner

The Product Owner represents the interests of all stakeholders in the project and is accountable for the final product. He/She gathers product needs from stakeholders, generates the Product Backlog, is accountable for the return on investment (ROI), and prepares the release strategy. The Product Owner uses Business Value Points to prioritize the Product Backlog, ensuring that the most useful functionality is built first.

Scrum is such an excellent vehicle for high-quality products because of the conflict between what the company needs and what the team can do.

Team

The team determines how to convert the Product Backlog into a functional increment inside a Sprint. Each team member is jointly accountable for the success of each iteration and the overall project. The team may be a cross-functional team such that each sub-team is responsible for a portion of the methodology that drives the team to add value in the sprint.

Scrum Master

The Scrum Master is in charge of the Scrum process. He/She makes certain that everyone follows the rules. He/She also removes roadblocks for the Team. The Scrum Master is not a team member.

Scrum Artifacts

Scrum methodology has 3 main artifacts:

  • Product Backlog
  • Burndown Chart
  • Sprint Backlog

Product Backlog

The Product Backlog contains a list of the product's requirements. It is a dynamically prioritized set of criteria that is always changing and arranged by Business Value. The product owner divides requirements into User Stories.

Burndown Chart

The Burndown chart displays the amount of work that remains for each Sprint. It is a highly handy method of displaying the relationship between work remaining at any point in time and Team progress. It uses the Burndown Chart to assess their progress with respect to the Planning and makes modifications as needed.

Sprint Backlog

The Sprint Backlog comprises all of the Team's committed User Stories for the current Sprint, which have been split down into Tasks. To fulfill the promise, all items in the Sprint Backlog should be built, tested, documented, and integrated.

How do I implement Scrum in personal development?

After getting a quick glimpse of Scrum, it's time to get to know the method I applied to myself. We have to remember that Scrum is an Agile Framework for the sake of project execution. Apparently, there is no execution without a plan that includes goals, budget, and resources. Therefore, we have to first discuss the method to plan for yourself as a promising project.

SWOT Analysis

The first step is to free yourself of different distractions and mental poisons. You may try to have a vacation before starting a new disciplined section of your life. Then, get a paper and pen with no phone or any other device. Start to imagine your new life. Imagine the car you need to buy, the home you need to live in, the people you need to help, and your family. Don't forget to cry for any time you have wasted. Cry more to free your heart from any remainders of your past life. After that, divide the paper into four sections for each section write a heading: "Strength", "Weaknesses", "Opportunities", and "Threats". I know that you have observed that SWOT is the acronym of the last mentioned words. Fill each section with your life points that accommodate the heading. You may need to read more about SWOT analysis before considering this step [4].

Goals and Key Objectives

After determining your thoughts about different strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. You have to start thinking about your goals and writing them in a SMART fashion. Yet another acronym. SMART refers to "Specific", "Measurable", "Attainable", "Relative", and "Time-bounded". Like we have practices in SWOT, we will apply the same concept for each goal. Each goal should meet these conditions. An example of a SMART goal: I need to solve 10 algorithmic problems in the next 4 weeks. This example shows that your goals should target a very specific thing you need to do with a way to measure the success of this goal and is challenging to achieve but not trivial. Not to mention that it is time bounded "in the next 4 weeks".

By applying this method and assessing each goal to the reference, you will reach very specific and not random tasks. Your vision should be sharp in order to achieve your goals.

Execution Plan

In this step, we reach the Scrum part. After prioritizing and determining goals, we should plan for achieving them. This plan should again adhere to the SMART reference. Such that, it should be a specific plan for your goals, a measurable plan to define success metrics, an attainable plan according to your energy and resources, relative to your SWOT analysis, and bounded with a timebox.

Using scrum as a framework, you will wear a different hat during the whole process. You will wear the hat of a product owner, another one for the team, and finally the hat of a scrum master. By knowing the tasks of each role, you will practice Scrum correctly and achieve its goals.

Your plan for achieving goals will be your product backlog. Each sprint will have chunks of these achievable tasks towards your goals. As you may know, the sprint timebox is between 1 to 4 weeks. From my experience, you have to determine this timebox based on the power of misery you live. For example, if you are deeply sad and starting to recover from sadness, you have to make the timebox for only one week. This will encourage you, especially at the beginning of adhering to this methodology. The tasks should be in chunks and in different severity levels. Not all tasks in a sprint should be critical. Because you may be in a burnout status so you have to decrease this by not assigning too many critical tasks.

The next image is a screenshot from Youtrack, a tool that I use to implement Scrum. The image shows the agile board of one of the sprints.

youtrack.png

Another point to take into consideration is to make a time buffer for each task. This buffer will help you to resist procrastination without burning out. For example, a task you have assigned to yourself that takes 3 hours to finish. A more practical estimation is to assign it for 3.5 hours. This half-hour will help you in bypassing any blocks also if you procrastinate at the beginning you will not get sad about not finishing the task because you still have time to finish it.

At the end of each sprint, don't forget to reflect on the sprint and solve any issues you faced. Check the burndown charts in the Youtrack tool and do root cause analysis.

Example of a one-week sprint

This example will consider that the sprint starts on Saturday and finishes on Friday.

  • Saturday: A design day for the current sprint. On this day, you will define the tasks you need to do, and define their time frame. These tasks are deduced from the backlog (Your plan).
  • Sunday: The first day of your sprint. On this day you will start with any tasks from the last sprint if there.
  • Monday: Continue working bro/sis.
  • Tuesday: Still time to finish the sprint.
  • Wednesday: No time to be burned out. You are the best one ever.
  • Thursday: A retrospective day. On this day, you reflect on the sprint and on yourself. You define the different impediments you faced and how to avoid them in the next sprint.
  • Friday: a free day.

Results and Conclusion

I applied this methodology for more than six months and found it effective. It made me less prone to burnout. Because I defined my goals and worked on them. Each time you drag a task done, you will feel relief feelings.

I hope this article will help you in your next endeavors. This method is applicable to studying, preparing for interviews, and others.

References

[1] What is scrum: agilearena.net/what-is-scrum

[2] Scrum - Learn how to scrum with the best of ‘em: atlassian.com/agile/scrum

[3] Scrum in a Nutshell: agile42.com/en/agile-community/agile-info-c..

[4] SWOT Analysis: investopedia.com/terms/s/swot.asp