A Sprint is a period of 2 to 4 weeks that is where specific parts of a project are developed. A Sprint begins shortly after the conclusion of the previous, and the two Sprint Planning Meetings should happen in the beginning of the Sprint.
The decision of what will be done in the next Sprint is an agreement made between the team and Product Owner during planning meeting, and what is agreed must be submitted at the end of the Sprint, in the Review meeting.
The first planning meeting, or Planning Meeting 1, what will be delivered in the Sprint is defined. In the second meeting, or Planning Meeting 2, the team will define what they have to do to accomplish the Sprint’s goal.
At a Planning Meeting, the Product Owner has already prepared the Product Backlog and explains what should be done in each Backlog item. After this explanation, the team estimates the effort required to complete each of these items. Knowing what is a priority for the Product Owner, and knowing how much effort is needed to complete each of the backlog items, the team and product owner must reach an agreement on what will be done in the Sprint. Besides defining the items to be finalized, a goal should also be set for this Sprint. This goal represents what should be finished at the end of Sprint in terms of value and it helps the team stay focused on what is most important for this Sprint.
In the Planning Meeting 2, the team should decide how it will finish each item by the end of the Sprint. There is no rule about how this should be done, however it is important that the team can divide the tasks by what can be done in a day or less. If necessary, the Product Owner can attend the meeting to answer any questions about what was selected for the Sprint. The PO is also allowed to invite people who can answer questions about the business or technical questions.
Planning well is extremely important for the success of the team during the Sprint. The more knowledge the team has about what should be done, the easier it is for the team to complete their tasks.
It is possible that a Sprint’s planning is done wrong, or that unexpected things happen during the Sprint. If this happens, you need to review what was agreed on or even cancel the Sprint.
If you have further questions about the planning of a Sprint, we have a great video on the subject on the YouTube channel “Scrum University”!
