How to define TRULY URGENT mid sprint interruptions?
What urgency actually looks like for Scrum teams
I want to start with something I hear constantly when I talk to Scrum Masters and product teams about mid-sprint interruptions.
They describe the problem as a process problem by saying:
“We need a better intake system.”
“We need stakeholders to stop bypassing the backlog.”
“We need leadership to respect the sprint.”
Those things might be true but…
I’ve come to believe the deeper problem is almost always a failure to build shared understanding about the outcome the team is trying to protect and what it genuinely costs to interrupt the team.
When teams have that shared understanding (something that they can clearly show the stakeholders), urgency becomes a tractable question.
When they don’t, it becomes a power struggle. And power struggles are exhausting… believe me!
In this post, we will learn how YOU can help your team build that shared understanding.
Let’s get started.