Do High And Low Performing Student Teams Use Scrum Differently In Capstone Projects?

In this paper, we present how student teams applied Scrum in their capstone projects and compare how the Scrum usage differed between the high and low performing teams. 16 student teams of 7-9 persons were taught Scrum during a lecture and a 4-hour Scrum simulation game, after which they applied Scrum in their capstone projects developed for external industrial customers during a six month period. We collected data by surveys (98 responses) and by interviewing all 16 teams at the end of the course. Our results show that the frequency of Scrum practice usage does not differ significantly between the low and high performing teams. However, the interviews showed that the high performing teams applied Scrum practices more thoroughly, e.g., by taking better advantage of the retrospective meetings and Daily Scrums and working more face-to-face, while low performing teams paid less attention to the proper way of applying the Scrum practices.