Increment

Scrum Artifacts: Increment

An Increment is a concrete stepping stone toward the Product Goal. Each Increment is additive to all prior Increments and thoroughly verified, ensuring that all Increments work together. In order to provide value, the Increment must be usable.

Multiple Increments may be created within a Sprint. The sum of the Increments is presented at the Sprint Review thus supporting empiricism. However, an Increment may be delivered to stakeholders prior to the end of the Sprint. The Sprint Review should never be considered a gate to releasing value.

Work cannot be considered part of an Increment unless it meets the Definition of Done.

Commitment: Definition of Done

The Definition of Done is a formal description of the state of the Increment when it meets the quality measures required for the product.

The moment a Product Backlog item meets the Definition of Done, an Increment is born.

The Definition of Done creates transparency by providing everyone a shared understanding of what work was completed as part of the Increment. If a Product Backlog item does not meet the Definition of Done, it cannot be released or even presented at the Sprint Review. Instead, it returns to the Product Backlog for future consideration.

If the Definition of Done for an increment is part of the standards of the organization, all Scrum Teams must follow it as a minimum. If it is not an organizational standard, the Scrum Team must create a Definition of Done appropriate for the product.

The Developers are required to conform to the Definition of Done. If there are multiple Scrum Teams working together on a product, they must mutually define and comply with the same Definition of Done.

By Scrum Guide

The Product Increment is the sum of all Product Backlog items completed during a Sprint and all previous Sprints.
The scope of the product increment is agreed upon with stakeholders and defined by the product owner.

At the end of a Sprint, the new Product Increment must be in a usable condition and meet the Scrum Team's Definition of Done for the Product Increment.

The increment is a step toward a vision or goal.
The increment must be in useable condition regardless of whether the Product Owner decides to release it.

The increment should deliver a business value, not just a part of the technology stack, i.e. database tables - vertical slices of functionality are preferred instead of component-based development.

Program increment is usually built during multiple sprints.

The house of Lego example: At sprint planning, the PO brings his product backlog with requirements. The development team with PO works together to refine those requirements and create user stories. Imagine that every user story is one piece of Lego. at the end of the sprint planning, the PO and development team create a sprint goal, in that sprint goal, they will specify what is/are the increment of value at the end of the sprint. Let’s pretend that the increment is a house of Lego. That house of Lego has value to the customer. So by working on a sprint, the development team will work on each Lego piece to put them all together to create a house of Lego, their increment of value. The clients are expecting a full house of Lego, not only 4 walls of the house. So if the development team finishes their sprint with just 4 walls, the clients will not be happy because 4 walls have no value to them.