A Reference Library for Teams Running Scrum.
Scrum Inc.’s reference library provides clear, practical guidance on Scrum and Agile fundamentals for leaders and practitioners. Whether you’re new or refreshing the basics, it’s a straightforward reference for improving execution and delivery.
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All
Foundations
Roles
Events
Artifacts
Patterns & Practices
Academic Papers
Foundations
The 3-5-3 of Scrum
Understand the three roles, five events, and three artifacts that make up the complete Scrum framework.
Foundations
Definition of Done
What the Definition of Done is, why it is the team's quality bar, and how it keeps work from piling up.
Foundations
Sprint Goal
What the Sprint Goal is, why it creates focus, and how to write one that guides real decisions.
Foundations
Product Goal
What the Product Goal is, why it anchors the Product Backlog, and how it connects Sprint work to direction.
Foundations
The Scrum Team
Learn why small, cross-functional, self-managing teams deliver faster, and how Scrum Team structure drives outcomes.
Roles
Product Owner
The accountabilities of the Product Owner role, what makes one effective, and the most common pitfalls to avoid.
Roles
Scrum Master
What the Scrum Master is accountable for, how the role helps the team deliver, and the most common ways it gets misused.
Roles
Developers
Who Developers are on a Scrum Team, what they own, and why "Developer" in Scrum is not the same as "software engineer."
Events
The Sprint
Why the Sprint is the heartbeat of Scrum, how it works, and the patterns that keep Sprints producing value.
Events
Sprint Planning
How Sprint Planning kicks off a Sprint, what it produces, and how to keep it focused.
Events
Daily Scrum
What the Daily Scrum is for, why it stays short, and how to keep it from becoming a status meeting.
Events
Sprint Review
How to run a Sprint Review that produces real stakeholder feedback and informs what the team builds next.
Events
Sprint Retrospective
Why the Sprint Retrospective drives team improvement, how it works, and what makes a useful retro.
Artifacts
Product Backlog
How the Product Backlog works as the single ordered source of work, and how to refine it to drive product value.
Artifacts
Sprint Backlog
How Developers use the Sprint Backlog and Sprint Goal to plan, execute, and adapt the work of a single Sprint.
Artifacts
Increment
What the Increment is, why it must meet the Definition of Done, and how Increments show real progress.
Patterns & Practices
Yesterday's Weather
A Scrum pattern for forecasting Sprint capacity using historical velocity instead of guesswork or wishful planning.
Patterns & Practices
Interrupt Buffer
A Scrum pattern for absorbing unplanned work into the Sprint without compromising the Sprint Goal or team velocity.
Patterns & Practices
Removing Impediments
A structured approach for surfacing and resolving blockers across Scrum and Scrum@Scale, including the Five Whats template.
Academic Paper
Jeff Sutherland's Complete Works
The full list of Dr. Jeff Sutherland’s published papers, books, and articles.
Academic Paper
Owning the Sky with Agile: Building a Fighter Jet Faster, Cheaper, Better with Scrum
J. Furuhjelm, J. Justice, J. Segertoft, JJ Sutherland
Academic Paper
Process Efficiency – Adapting Flow to the Agile Improvement Effort
F. Verbruggen, J. Sutherland, J. Martijn van der Werf, S. Brinkkemper, A. Sutherland
Academic Paper
Teams that Finish Early Accelerate Faster: A Pattern Language for High Performing Scrum Teams
J. Sutherland, N. Harrison, and J. Riddle
Academic Paper
Hyper-Productive Metrics
S. Downey and J. Sutherland
Academic Paper
Scrum in Sales
R.van Solingen, J. Sutherland, D. de Waard
Academic Paper
Hitting The Wall: What to Do When High Performing Scrum Teams Overwhelm Operations
J. Sutherland and R. Frohman
Academic Paper
Future of Scrum – Type C Scrum
J. Sutherland, Ph.D.
Academic Paper
Virtual Reality Meets Scrum: Management to Leadership
D. Friis, J. Ostergaard, and J. Sutherland
Academic Paper
How a Traditional Project Manager Transforms to Scrum: PMBOK vs. Scrum
J. Sutherland and N. Ahmad
Academic Paper
Scrum in Church: Saving the World One Team at a Time
A. Sutherland, J. Sutherland, and C. Hegarty
Academic Paper
Take No Prisoners: How a Venture Capital Group Does Scrum
J. Sutherland and I. Altman
Academic Paper
Fully Distributed Scrum: Linear Scalability Between San Francisco & India
J. Sutherland, G. Schoonheim, N. Kumar, V. Pandey, and S. Vishal
Academic Paper
Shock Therapy: A Bootstrap for Hyper-Productive Scrum
J. Sutherland, S. Downey, and B. Granvik
Academic Paper
Scrum and CMMI – Going from Good to Great: Are You Ready Ready to Be Done Done
C. Jakobsen and J. Sutherland
Academic Paper
Scrum and CMMI Level 5: A Magic Potion for Code Warriors
K. Johnson, C. Jacobson, and J. Sutherland
Academic Paper
Distributed Scrum: Agile Project Management with Outsourced Development Teams
J. Sutherland, A. Viktorov, J. Blount, & N. Puntikov
Academic Paper
Reporting to Executive Management through Metrics
B. Barton, K. Schwaber, D. Rawsthorne, with F. Beauregard, B. McMichael, J. McAuliffe; V. Szalvay
Academic Paper
The Future of Scrum: Parallel Pipelining of Sprints in Complex Projects
J. Sutherland
Academic Paper
The Emergence of a Business Object Component Architecture
J. Sutherland
Academic Paper
The Scrum Development Process
K. Schwaber