Daily Stand-Up - Not Just a Ritual

Here is a brief write-up about Daily Stand-up ritual of 'Being Agile' journey. 

Motive is to give quick overview about this ceremony, sharing some of the learning. For detail reading, I would recommend the link given at the end of this article.  

What is the purpose of daily stand-up:
  • Shared understanding of goals and current status 
  • Plan your day (self-management)
  • Coordinate efforts, ask for help, offer help
  • Ensure team communication
  • Identify as a Team

What are daily stand-up basics, and these are designed for important purpose (refer to links given at the end):
  • Fix time
  • Fix place
  • Must not be more than 15 min
  • Whole team gather themselves
  • Everyone derive her/his status following three scrum magical questions. Important: It is all about sharing plan, not the task names. Focus should be, what I am doing to contribute to delivery.
  • Breakout session at the end or later, if anyone need to discuss more
  • Share plan which makes sense to team in bigger context for delivery, It is not about status sharing.
  • Only PIGs are allowed to speak. Chickens can join as listener although (refer to scrum pig/chicken story please)

NOT to do:
  • Not being regular
  • Coming without preparation
  • Story telling 
  • Problem solving
  • Using it as reporting or tracking meeting, 
  • Reporting to a Leader or to SM or to Manager. It is all about team communication.
  • Work assignment - Mostly, it is done during sprint plan and weekly scrum. There could be few exceptions like helping anyone or any critical work, which team can take call.
  • Running across locations (Soln: break in co-located teams. Share the brief in Teams space – only if day to day work is too interdependent - which is neither ideal, nor productive)