PST cheat sheet

Scrum is founded on empiricism (knowledge comes from experience, decisions from observation) and lean thinking (reduce waste, focus on essentials).

Three empirical pillars: transparency (emergent process and work visible to those doing and receiving it), inspection (frequent checks of artifacts and progress toward goals), and adaptation (adjust as soon as unacceptable deviation is found).

The five Scrum values are Commitment, Focus, Openness, Respect, and Courage; they give direction to the team's work, actions, and behavior.

Scrum is a lightweight framework that helps people, teams, and organizations generate value through adaptive solutions for complex problems; complexity here means more unknowns than knowns.

Decision rule: if inspection is not frequent enough, transparency breaks down and adaptation becomes impossible - fix transparency first, then inspect, then adapt.

Scrum employs an iterative, incremental approach to optimize predictability and control risk; each iteration is a Sprint of fixed length of one month or less.

The Scrum Team is a small team of people: one Scrum Master, one Product Owner, and Developers; typical size is 10 or fewer people.

Scrum is intentionally incomplete; it defines only the parts required to implement its theory, and the team fills in the rest with practices, processes, and tools.

Accountabilities: Product Owner maximizes product value; Scrum Master establishes Scrum as defined in the Scrum Guide; Developers create any aspect of a usable Increment each Sprint.

Five events: the Sprint (container, one month or less), Sprint Planning, Daily Scrum, Sprint Review, and Sprint Retrospective; every event is a formal opportunity to inspect and adapt.

Sprint Planning (max 8 hours for a one-month Sprint) addresses Why (Sprint Goal), What (selected Product Backlog items), and How (plan); the Sprint Goal is the single objective for the Sprint.

Daily Scrum is a 15-minute event for Developers, held at the same time and place each working day, to inspect progress toward the Sprint Goal and adapt the Sprint Backlog.

Sprint Review (max 4 hours for a one-month Sprint) inspects the Sprint outcome with stakeholders and determines future adaptations; it is a working session, not a status presentation.

Sprint Retrospective (max 3 hours for a one-month Sprint) plans ways to increase quality and effectiveness; the most impactful improvements may be addressed as soon as possible, even added to the Sprint Backlog.

Three artifacts: Product Backlog (Product Owner accountable, with a Product Goal), Sprint Backlog (Developers, with a Sprint Goal), and Increment (Developers, with the Definition of Done).

Definition of Done is a formal description of the state of the Increment when it meets the quality measures required for the product; if not an organizational standard, the Scrum Team must create one.

The Product Backlog is an emergent, ordered list and the single source of work undertaken by the Scrum Team; the Product Goal is its long-term target, and only the Product Owner orders it.

Facilitator stance: hold the process and the container, keep the group's content ownership with participants, and make decisions and disagreements visible rather than resolving them for the group.

Liberating Structures commonly used in Professional Scrum teaching include 1-2-4-All, What/So What/Now What, Troika Consulting, Impromptu Networking, and 15% Solutions.

Training From the Back of the Brain (4C model) sequences a class as Connections, Concepts, Concrete Practice, Conclusions - roughly 10-20% lecture and 80-90% practice.

Flipped classroom rule: front-load content exposure (reading, video, Guide reading) before class; reserve live time for practice, simulation, and debrief.

Debrief structure after any simulation: what happened (observations), so what (meaning against Scrum theory), now what (a concrete change to try).

Psychological safety in the classroom is created by making participation optional in form (silent writing first, then pairs, then whole group) and by modeling the Scrum values explicitly.

Course-level rule: Professional Scrum courses are taught by Professional Scrum Trainers and are not a lecture series; the PST is accountable for content fidelity to the Scrum Guide and the course learning objectives.

Assessment design: align each exercise to a stated learning objective, and use the exercise debrief as the evidence of whether the objective was met.

Scrum.org's Professional Scrum Competencies are grouped into three focus areas: Understanding and Applying Scrum, Developing People and Teams, and Managing Products with Agility.

Understanding and Applying Scrum covers Scrum theory, the Scrum framework, value delivery, and evidence-based management (EBM) practices.

Developing People and Teams covers self-managing teams, facilitation, coaching, mentoring, teaching, and people/team development.

Managing Products with Agility covers product vision, product backlog management, forecasting and release planning, stakeholder management, and product value.

Evidence-Based Management has four Key Value Areas: Current Value (CV), Unrealized Value (UV), Time to Market (T2M), and Ability to Innovate (A2I).

EBM rule: measure to improve, not to judge; Key Value Metrics inform decisions and hypotheses, and each KVA balances a competing concern (e.g., current value vs. unrealized value).

Competency progression is not linear certification: knowledge (courses, assessment) is separate from demonstrable practice in a real environment.

Self-managing teams choose who, how, and on what to work; self-organizing (older term) referred to how people organize their work - the current Guide uses self-managing.

Professional Scrum Master (PSM) courses are offered at I and II levels; Professional Scrum Product Owner (PSPO) at I, II, and III; Professional Scrum Developer (PSD); Applying Professional Scrum (APS); and Professional Scrum with Kanban (PSK).

PSM I assessment: 80 questions, 60-minute time limit, passing score 85%, multiple choice, taken online, no course attendance prerequisite.

PSM II assessment: 30 questions, 90-minute time limit, passing score 85%, multiple-choice and essay-style questions requiring written answers.

PSPO I assessment: 80 questions, 60-minute time limit, passing score 85%; PSPO II: 40 questions, 90 minutes, 85% passing.

PSD assessment: 80 questions, 60 minutes, 85% passing; PSK assessment: 40 questions, 60 minutes, 85% passing.

All Scrum.org assessments are based on the current Scrum Guide and the associated course learning objectives; the Scrum Guide is the primary reference.

Professional Scrum Trainer (PST) status requires passing the relevant highest-level assessment (e.g., PSM III for PSM courses), a trainer interview/observation process, and ongoing community participation.

Assessment retake rule: a free second attempt is offered within a limited window (14 days) after a failed first attempt; no official affiliation with any other certification body is implied.

Scrum is founded on empiricism (knowledge comes from experience, decisions from observation) and lean thinking (reduce waste, focus on essentials).

Three empirical pillars: transparency (emergent process and work visible to those doing and receiving it), inspection (frequent checks of artifacts and progress toward goals), and adaptation (adjust as soon as unacceptable deviation is found).

The five Scrum values are Commitment, Focus, Openness, Respect, and Courage; they give direction to the team's work, actions, and behavior.

Scrum is a lightweight framework that helps people, teams, and organizations generate value through adaptive solutions for complex problems; complexity here means more unknowns than knowns.

Decision rule: if inspection is not frequent enough, transparency breaks down and adaptation becomes impossible - fix transparency first, then inspect, then adapt.

Scrum employs an iterative, incremental approach to optimize predictability and control risk; each iteration is a Sprint of fixed length of one month or less.

The Scrum Team is a small team of people: one Scrum Master, one Product Owner, and Developers; typical size is 10 or fewer people.

Scrum is intentionally incomplete; it defines only the parts required to implement its theory, and the team fills in the rest with practices, processes, and tools.

Accountabilities: Product Owner maximizes product value; Scrum Master establishes Scrum as defined in the Scrum Guide; Developers create any aspect of a usable Increment each Sprint.

Five events: the Sprint (container, one month or less), Sprint Planning, Daily Scrum, Sprint Review, and Sprint Retrospective; every event is a formal opportunity to inspect and adapt.

Sprint Planning (max 8 hours for a one-month Sprint) addresses Why (Sprint Goal), What (selected Product Backlog items), and How (plan); the Sprint Goal is the single objective for the Sprint.

Daily Scrum is a 15-minute event for Developers, held at the same time and place each working day, to inspect progress toward the Sprint Goal and adapt the Sprint Backlog.

Sprint Review (max 4 hours for a one-month Sprint) inspects the Sprint outcome with stakeholders and determines future adaptations; it is a working session, not a status presentation.

Sprint Retrospective (max 3 hours for a one-month Sprint) plans ways to increase quality and effectiveness; the most impactful improvements may be addressed as soon as possible, even added to the Sprint Backlog.

Three artifacts: Product Backlog (Product Owner accountable, with a Product Goal), Sprint Backlog (Developers, with a Sprint Goal), and Increment (Developers, with a Definition of Done).

Definition of Done is a formal description of the state of the Increment when it meets the quality measures required for the product; if not an organizational standard, the Scrum Team must create one.

The Product Backlog is an emergent, ordered list and the single source of work undertaken by the Scrum Team; the Product Goal is its long-term target, and only the Product Owner orders it.

Facilitator stance: hold the process and the container, keep the group's content ownership with participants, and make decisions and disagreements visible rather than resolving them for the group.

Liberating Structures commonly used in Professional Scrum teaching include 1-2-4-All, What/So What/Now What, Troika Consulting, Impromptu Networking, and 15% Solutions.

Training From the Back of the Brain (4C model) sequences a class as Connections, Concepts, Concrete Practice, Conclusions - roughly 10-20% lecture and 80-90% practice.

Flipped classroom rule: front-load content exposure (reading, video, Guide reading) before class; reserve live time for practice, simulation, and debrief.

Debrief structure after any simulation: what happened (observations), so what (meaning against Scrum theory), now what (a concrete change to try).

Psychological safety in the classroom is created by making participation optional in form (silent writing first, then pairs, then whole group) and by modeling the Scrum values explicitly.

Course-level rule: Professional Scrum courses are taught by Professional Scrum Trainers and are not a lecture series; the PST is accountable for content fidelity to the Scrum Guide and the course learning objectives.

Assessment design: align each exercise to a stated learning objective, and use the exercise debrief as the evidence of whether the objective was met.

Scrum.org's Professional Scrum Competencies are grouped into three focus areas: Understanding and Applying Scrum, Developing People and Teams, and Managing Products with Agility.

Understanding and Applying Scrum covers Scrum theory, the Scrum framework, value delivery, and evidence-based management (EBM) practices.

Developing People and Teams covers self-managing teams, facilitation, coaching, mentoring, teaching, and people/team development.

Managing Products with Agility covers product vision, product backlog management, forecasting and release planning, stakeholder management, and product value.

Evidence-Based Management has four Key Value Areas: Current Value (CV), Unrealized Value (UV), Time to Market (T2M), and Ability to Innovate (A2I).

EBM rule: measure to improve, not to judge; Key Value Metrics inform decisions and hypotheses, and each KVA balances a competing concern (e.g., current value vs. unrealized value).

Competency progression is not linear certification: knowledge (courses, assessment) is separate from demonstrable practice in a real environment.

Self-managing teams choose who, how, and on what to work; self-organizing (older term) referred to how people organize their work - the current Guide uses self-managing.

Professional Scrum Master (PSM) courses are offered at I and II levels; Professional Scrum Product Owner (PSPO) at I, II, and III; Professional Scrum Developer (PSD); Applying Professional Scrum (APS); and Professional Scrum with Kanban (PSK).

PSM I assessment: 80 questions, 60-minute time limit, passing score 85%, multiple choice, taken online, no course attendance prerequisite.

PSM II assessment: 30 questions, 90-minute time limit, passing score 85%, multiple-choice and essay-style questions requiring written answers.

PSPO I assessment: 80 questions, 60-minute time limit, passing score 85%; PSPO II: 40 questions, 90 minutes, 85% passing.

PSD assessment: 80 questions, 60 minutes, 85% passing; PSK assessment: 40 questions, 60 minutes, 85% passing.

All Scrum.org assessments are based on the current Scrum Guide and the associated course learning objectives; the Scrum Guide is the primary reference.

Professional Scrum Trainer (PST) status requires passing the relevant highest-level assessment (e.g., PSM III for PSM courses), a trainer interview/observation process, and ongoing community participation.

Assessment retake rule: a free second attempt is offered within a limited window (14 days) after a failed first attempt; no official affiliation with any other certification body is implied.