The Sprint Backlog is the Sprint Goal, the selected items and the plan to deliver them — and it belongs entirely to the Developers.
The Scrum Guide describes the Sprint Backlog as composed of three things: the Sprint
Goal (why), the set of Product Backlog items selected for the Sprint
(what), and an actionable plan for delivering the Increment (how).
People remember the middle one and forget the other two. That is why so many Sprint
Backlogs are just a column of tickets.
It belongs to the Developers
It changes during the Sprint
This surprises people who expect a plan to be fixed. As the Developers work, they
learn: a task turns out to need two, an assumption breaks, something is simpler than it
looked. The Sprint Backlog is updated to match.
What does not change is the Sprint Goal. The scope can be renegotiated with
the Product Owner as more is learned; the Goal is the thing that stays still so the
renegotiation has a reference point.
Making it real
- Items small enough to move. If nothing changes state for three days, the
items are too big to see progress through. - One state at a time. An item that is in three places at once is in none.
- Visible. A Sprint Backlog nobody looks at is a document, not a plan.
In Agile Together
Step 5 breaks a single item down into a checklist of 3 to 7 tasks, each fitting in a day or less — the practical answer to an item that is too big to move.
Next
Next: the Daily Scrum — fifteen minutes that decide the day.
Agile Together is a free course. The package — scripts plus a portable Python — is a single download: get the course package. You install nothing.
Project Together
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Project Management