Professional Scrum Master II (PSM II) — Question 69

Your company has notified the stakeholders that they will be delivering the first release of a new product within ten Sprints. On the seventh Sprint, the Scrum
Team discovers that they will not be able to include all of the expected features within the first release. The Product Owner believes if they remove some items from the Definition of Done they will be able to accelerate the development process. The Development Team objects to this idea as it will lead to technical debt.
As a Scrum Master, what would be the best two ways to explain to the Product Owner the impact of technical debt? (Choose two.)

Answer options

• A. As long as there is still technical debt in the current release, feature development for the next release cannot be started. The Product Owner must first agree to this impact before allowing changes to the Definition of Done.
• B. Reducing the Definition of Done will introduce unknown errors as development progresses and functionality is added. The system can become more difficult to stabilize as work progresses. Development for the actual release as well as future releases will be slowed down in unpredictable ways.
• C. Releasing the version upon a reduced Definition of Done creates false assumptions about the actual state of the system. This will create many interruptions during the development of the next release as fixes will need to be done to the previous release caused from a reduction of quality.
• D. The amount of technical debt will need to be analyzed in order to understand the impact on subsequent releases in order to allocate additional Sprints at the end of the project.

Correct answer: B, C

Explanation

Option B correctly highlights that reducing the Definition of Done can cause unforeseen errors and make stabilization harder, affecting both current and future development. Option C emphasizes that releasing with a lower Definition of Done can mislead stakeholders and result in significant interruptions due to necessary fixes in the prior release. Options A and D do not directly address the immediate consequences of technical debt related to quality and stability.