Podcast || Scrum Guide 2025 Expansion Pack vs Scrum Guide 2020 || Whats New and Differences? Podcast || Scrum Guide 2025 Expansion Pack vs Scrum Guide 2020 || Whats New and Differences?
In this episode, we dive deep into the evolution of Scrum by comparing the foundational Scrum Guide 2020 with the latest Scrum Guide Expansion Pack 2025. The 2020 Scrum Guide, developed by Ken Schwaber and Jeff Sutherland, serves as the definitive guide to Scrum, outlining its definition, elements, and rules. It emphasizes that changing its core design or leaving out elements can limit Scrum's benefits or even render it useless.
The Scrum Guide Expansion Pack 2025, authored by Ralph Jocham, John Coleman, and Jeff Sutherland, is an adaptation of the original 2020 Guide. Its purpose is to offer additional guidance for current times, explaining the "what" and "why" of each Scrum element through a future-looking lens, and assuming some existing fluency with Scrum.
Here are some of the key new additions and significant differences discussed in this podcast:
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New Sections and Complementary Theory: The Expansion Pack introduces comprehensive sections on topics such as Artificial Intelligence (AI), the Self-managing Scrum Team, Cadence, Professionalism, Emergence, Complexity, Leadership, Systems Thinking, Product Thinking, Discovery, First Principles, and People and Change. It also details concepts like Accountability, reduction of non-value-adding waste, framing work as problems or opportunities, and continuous improvement.
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Evolving Roles and New Stakeholder Types:
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Product Developers (formerly just "Developers" in the 2020 Guide) are now explicitly defined as potentially human or automated, though at least one human Product Developer is required. They are accountable for creating the Sprint Backlog plan, instilling quality, and delivering usable Increments.
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The Product Owner's accountability is further clarified, with a strong emphasis on maximizing long-term value and continuous stakeholder engagement.
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The Scrum Master is highlighted as a change agent operating at all organizational levels, focused on coaching, removing impediments, and improving the adaptiveness of the entire Scrum ecosystem.
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Two new specific role types are introduced: Stakeholder (an entity interested in, affected by, or impacting the product, including customers, users, decision-makers, and even inanimate ones like the law), and Supporter (a specific type of Stakeholder who fosters the climate and helps remove demotivating factors).
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A significant shift is the explicit mention that Product Owners, Product Developers, and Scrum Masters should step down if they are unwilling, ready, or able to fulfill their professional responsibilities.
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Refined Artifacts and Commitments:
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A major new commitment is the Definition of Outcome Done, which focuses on the observable evidence and measures required to demonstrate realized benefits or value validation for the Product. This underscores a shift towards outcomes over outputs.
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The previous "Definition of Done" for the Increment is renamed to Definition of Output Done, specifically describing the quality measures for an Increment to be delivered to stakeholders.
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The Product itself is now defined as a long-lived artifact that delivers continuous value, balancing short-term growth with long-term concerns.
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Product Backlog Items can now include both Acceptance Criteria (what is complete) and Outcome Criteria (the why behind the what, linking to value delivery).
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The Product Goal is framed as a medium-term objective, potentially expressed as hypotheses about closing "satisfaction gaps".
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A Product Vision is acknowledged as an optional, long-term input, but the Expansion Pack notes it can be a "work of fiction" where experiments and emergence are key.
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Evolved Scrum Events:
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Sprint length is clarified as "no longer than four weeks".
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The Daily Scrum now explicitly supports Product Developers aligning their progress towards the Sprint Goal or Product Goal.
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Sprint Review includes inspecting the results against both the Definition of Output Done and the Definition of Outcome Done.
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The Sprint Retrospective is expanded to include discussions on improving outcomes, professionalism, and the flow of validated value.
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Emphasis on Adaptability and Value: The Expansion Pack highlights the importance of multi-Scrum-Team Products sharing common goals and backlogs to maximize transparency and value. It reinforces that Scrum fosters aligned autonomy within a bounded structure, moving from a fixed "immutable" framework to an "evolving" one. It also introduces the OODA Loop (Observe, Orient, Decide, Act) as a framework for applying Scrum Values in complex decision-making!
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