Chris Spagnuolo’s EdgeHopper

In Scrum, you can be one of two things: a Pig or a Chicken.  The names come from Ken Schwaber’s book in which he describes an old joke.  There are a few versions of the joke, but I like this one the best:

A chicken was talking with a pig about how good their farmer was to them in the way he provided shelter, food, and protected them from danger. The chicken thought it would be a nice gesture to show their gratitude to the farmer by serving him a breakfast of bacon and eggs the next morning. The pig thought about it for a while and then commented, “Let me see if I have this right. We are going to provide the good farmer with a breakfast of bacon and eggs. I think I’ll pass on the gesture.  As I see it, you will only be  involved in the project, while I will be committed to it!”

The Pigs are the members of the team that are committed to the project at a very high level.  The Chickens are anyone outside the Team who have somewhat of an interest, but are not committed to making things actually work.  It’s alright to have Chickens involved, but they must do so more as observers to the process than as active participants.  They can muddy the waters and sometimes even obscure the voice of the Product Owner.

Case in point:  We recently held a Sprint Review Meeting with one of our Product Owners.  We decided to invite some other folks from our organization and from a subcontractor’s organization…a few Chickens.  We thought it would provide insight into what we were developing during that iteration.  We generally timebox our intermediate Sprint Reviews to no more than 1 hour (we do 2-week Sprints).  As the development team began demonstrating our new functionality, numerous questions and comments began to fly…not from the Product Owner, but from our Chickens.  The questions involved some misunderstandings about the functionality that was developed, and then degenerated into a criticism of the demonstration itself, all with the Product Owner in the background.  As the ScrumMaster, I tried very hard to reduce these comments, explain the purpose of the Sprint Review and get back to the demos and client feedback.  No such luck.  The questions and comments kept coming.  It was nearly the end of the hour and we still didn’t have a chance to really hear from the Product Owner.  When I finally asked the Product Owner for feedback on what was demoed, he was very quiet and offered minimal feedback.  The clucking Chickens had derailed our Sprint Review.

Now, some of the points the Chickens were clucking about were good ones.  Other points indicated a general lack of understanding of the Scrum process in varying degrees.  The day after the review, I tried to help them understand what had happened.  Of course, most of the Chickens agreed that the other Chickens needed to stop clucking so loudly.  I made the point again, stating that all of the Chickens needed to stop clucking. I put some ground rules into effect for our upcoming Sprint Reviews.  While the Chickens’ comments were welcomed, they would have to wait until after the Sprint Review to express them.  The Sprint Review meeting was to focus on demonstrating the new functionality and soliciting feedback from the Product Owner.

As ScrumMasters, we must ensure that the simple Scrum rules are followed.  We must ensure that free, open, undisturbed, and unadulterated communication occurs between the Team and the Product Owner.  Sometimes this means that we need to step up and quiet things down if the noise from the Chickens begins to overwhelm the Product Owner’s voice in the project.  Remember, when it comes down to it, the Product Owner and the Team are the ones getting the work done.  They know where the project needs to go.  They know that it’s up to them to maximize the return on investment and produce valuable products.  The Chickens (as good as their intentions may be) can be a distraction.  Their clucking can sometimes guide us down the wrong path and lead to wasteful development efforts.