The Scrum Method has become extremely popular. Why? This method promises to do twice as much in half the time. What business wouldn’t want that? Tesla, Apple and Google all work exclusively with the Scrum Method now. The method is effective, flexible, and promotes innovation and results in a reduced time-to-market.

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Additional benefits are that the Scrum Method offers more freedom and responsibility for employees. But how can the Scrum Method be introduced into a company? Will this happen automatically? For start-ups that can invent themselves from scratch, introducing the Scrum Method from the start is easy. However, for existing companies it isn’t as easy, especially during a rebrand. The Scrum Method sounds attractive, yet it requires considerable change within the organisation: a new organisational structure, a new way of working, a new culture and a new work environment. So why would you choose to use the Scrum Method during a rebrand? Let’s look at the pros and cons:

Advantages of the Scrum Method during a rebrand

The Scrum Method requires team members to work closely together, which allows for a great deal of knowledge sharing. This can be extremely helpful, especially during a rebrand with a new team and a tight deadline. In the Scrum Method goals are not only set by Sprint*, but also by day, allowing the team more flexibility. This is beneficial for managing the team and for the individual team members as well. Each Sprint will be evaluated by the team as well as with the client, which promotes feedback and openness. Where previously only weekly update meetings with the principal client and fortnightly meetings with the Steerco were held, now the additional Sprint Review and Sprint Retrospective meetings give excellent opportunities for giving further feedback to the team and for reviewing the quality of the work at the same time.

Disadvantages of the Scrum Method during a rebrand

As with every method, there are also some disadvantages. Working according to the Scrum Method provides limited opportunities for creating reports. A rebrand is a complex and multidisciplinary project, during which progress needs to be monitored on a vast number of components. A rebrand consists of many aspects that cannot be easily translated into Product Backlog** items. All these items have their own description, grouping, estimate and value, and it would take too much to describe and translate each and every item into a Product Backlog. Often the description has to remain generic to be workable. Budgetary control can also be challenging when using the Scrum Method, as is it difficult to schedule which result has to be realised on which date and against which budget.

Using a hybrid method

Based on my own experience, I’m a fan of a hybrid way of working, where the Scrum Method is mixed with some more traditional project management practices. A daily stand-up is definitely an excellent occasion to co-ordinate with each other what has to be done that day. To get a more detailed understanding of what is going on, I would suggest also holding the traditional status meeting and keeping a status list. This can easily be combined with the scrum-method. For budgeting and budgetary control, I prefer to assess the cost beforehand using our Impact Analysis, and then subsequently control and adjust the budget during the project. Obviously, there is a need for flexibility so that things can be adjusted in the meantime or when certain new insights will arise. The project scope is often subject to change which inevitably will have consequences for the budget. On a case by case basis, I discuss with the customer which project method is most applicable for their specific project. All previous experiences with all project management methods will be taken into consideration. Since all of our project managers are both Prince as well as Scrum (Product Owner) certified, we can offer the customer an appropriate project management method for every individual situation or ambition.

*A sprint is a timeframe of a month or less, in which something is produced or delivered, which complies with the definition of “done”. During the entire development time, the length of each sprint will be subsequent to the previous sprint.

**The Product Backlog is a list of items that relate to the functionality of the deliverables. It’s the underlying framework of user requirements for the project.

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