ServiceNow - Agile in ServiceNow The ServiceNow Agile Development application is an iterative and incremental process for software development environments. Agile Development application is enhanced with Agile Development 0. Agile Development 0 provides a unified agile development environment for release, and/or project-based delivery. Refer the documentation at Agile Development 0. Topics Create and Manage Agile Projects Creating Agile Teams Setting up the Team Associating Users Create Sprints Create Products Agile Board Backlog Planning Backlog Creation Epic Creation Story Creation General UI Navigation Bulk Updates via Standard Lists Sprint Planning Create a Sprint Plan Sprint Start Sprint Sprint Board Complete Sprint Other methods of creating and viewing stories Create and Manage Agile Projects An overview of the tasks involved in creating an agile project. The following tables, arranged by task group, list the tasks involved in creating an agile project. order to create an agile group and add group members Set up a development group Note: The Project Manager role is needed in Task How do I do this? Create the agile group Navigate to Project > Agile > Groups and click New. Add group members Navigate to the Group members related list on the Group form and click New. Assign the group capacity Navigate to Project > Agile > Groups, select the desired group, and enter a number in thepoints field. Add phases to a project from the project workbench Task How do I do this? Create a waterfall phase for a project Click the Add phase icon ( ) and select Waterfall from the Phase Type choice list. Create an agile phase for a project Click the Add phase icon ( ) and select from the Phase Agile Type choice list.
Create a test phase for a project Click the Add phase icon ( ) and select Test from the Phase Type choice list. Add details to a project phase from the project workbench Task How do I do this? View phase details in list view or VTB Click the List or VTB button in the project workbench header. Create a task for a waterfall phase Click the phase in the timeline and then click New in the detail view header. Assign a group to an agile phase Edit the Agile phase and select a group in the Group field. Select sprints for an agile phase Edit the Agile phase, ensure that a group has been assigned, and select a Start Sprint and End Sprint. Create new stories for an agile phase Click the Agile phase in the project workbench and click New in the detail view header. Groom stories for one project Click the Manage Stories button to open the Manage Stories dialog box. Groom stories across multiple projects Click the Manage Stories related link on Group form. Assign a group to an agile phase Click the Agile phase edit icon and select the group from the Group c hoice list. Creating Agile Teams Using the Filter Navigator, navigate to Agile Development -> Create Agile Group. Agile Teams in ServiceNow are represented as standard ServiceNow Groups. Users with the Project Manager roles have an option in the Filter Navigator to Create Agile Group.
Create an Agile Team (You can name your team whatever you want). 3. When finished, click Submit. Setting up the Team In the Filter Navigator, navigate to the list of Agile Groups: Agile Development > Groups.
You should see the group that you created earlier. To open the record, click the group you created. 3. Fill in the Group capacity field. Many of the fields are optional, but the one that your team will need to fill in is the Group capacity field. This is the velocity of the team per sprint. At the bottom of the record are the two primary releated lists: Group Members and Sprints. Associating Users From the Group Members related list, click Edit. In the real world you may need administrative permissions to modify this list. Add users to your team. To add users, from the left slush bucket, select a user, and then click the right-arrow, the user moves to the right slush bucket. Ensure that the user that you have logged in as is added to the team.
3. Click Save. Your list should now look similar to the following: Note: You may see a column that says Average points per sprint. As a Scrum best practice, ignore this field. People don't have a velocity; teams have a velocity. This field is a legacy field and will be hidden in a future release. Create Sprints There are two primary ways that you can create Sprints. The first is from the Group record. The second is on the Agile Board. The Agile Board is the prefered method, however, since we are on the Group record we will go over creation from here.
From the Group record, select the Sprints related list and then click New. Give the Sprint a name ( Short description), a Planned start date, and a Planned end date, and then click Submit. You now have a Sprint record that you can view from the Group record. Create Products Using the Filter Navigator, navigate to the list of products: Agile Development > Products. Click New. When the form appears, in the Short description field, enter a name for your product. Be creative!
3. Click Submit. The screen returns to the list of products. Click the product that you just created to open the record. Locate and click the Groups related list. 4. Click Edit.
5. 6. 7. In the list of teams, find and select your team. Add the team to the right slush bucket of groups, by clicking the right-arrow. Click Save. By adding teams to the list of groups working on the product, you restrict which groups are available on the Story form when you are managing the stories for your product. Agile Board Introduced in Kingston, the Agile Board is a new User Experience that was designed to be used in the day-to-day activities of Backlog Planning, Sprint Planning, and tracking the team's sprints using the Sprint Board. Using the Filter Navigator, navigate to the Agile Board; Agile Development > Agile Board. Once the Agile Board appears, collapse the ServiceNow Filter Navigator, as all further navigation is self-contained. Within the Agile Board, there are four navigation elements along the top of the page: Home Backlog Planning Sprint Planning Sprint Board
The Home tab of the Agile Board contains the Release Burndown and Sprint Burndown charts. If you have Performance Analytics, there are additional tabs that have default reports for Stories and Team Velocity. Backlog Planning Navigate to the Backlog Planning page on the Agile Board by clicking the Backlog Planning tab in the top navigation. The Backlog Planning page was designed for Product Owners to create and manage their backlog(s). If you do not have the Product Owner role you will need to ask your Product Owner to share a backlog with you in order to view it.
Along the top area, there are three metrics to tell you the total number of stories on the backlog, the number of stories that have blank point sizes, and the number of stories that have empty acceptance criteria. On the left-hand side is the list of Epics that have stories that are on your backlog. Both the metric squares and the Epics list can be used to filter the list of stories that show in the backlog story list. Click the No story points metric. From the Backlog list, click the number field associated with a story. 3. On the Story form, enter a number in the Points field, and then click Update. The Story that you selected should no longer appear in the Backlog list. Backlog Creation The Personal Backlog is a new construct added in Kingston. It is a conditions-based approach to defining the criteria for what stories should be in your backlog. Users will need the Product Owner role in order to create and manage Backlogs. From the Backlog Planning page, click the + button next to the Backlog Selector.
3. 4. The Personal Backlog creation screen appears. Enter a name for your new backlog. The bottom section is where you define the filter condition that your stories will need to meet in order to show up on your backlog. The filter condition of Active is true and Sprint is empty are already in place, as the definition of a backlog in Scrum, is stories that have not yet been planned for in a sprint. Next to the Sprint is empty fields, click AND. Add the condition Product is CRM Portal. 5. 6. You can add additional conditions if you need. For example, if you want to see stories across multiple products, click the OR button after the first Product and then add an additional condition Product is <>. To finish creating your backlog, click Submit. The new backlog record appears.
Epic Creation From the Backlog Planning screen, click the down caret () that is next to the Create Story button, and then click Create Epic. A new Epic form appears. Fill in the Short description field and then click Submit. Remember what you named this Epic. Once you are back on the Backlog Planning screen, you may notice that the Epic you just created is not in the Epics filter on the right. This is because the list of Epics in the filter is based off of the stories in your backlog. Because this newly created Epic does not have any stories associated with it, it will not show up in the list. We will add a story to it in the next section. Story Creation Click Create Story. A modal dialog appears with a new Story form. When creating a story from the Backlog Planning page, the Agile Board automatically fills in any field that it can from the Personal Backlog definition. For example, the Product field should be filled in with CRM Portal. In the Short Description field, enter a name for your story.
3. 4. 5. 6. In the Epic field, enter the name of the Epic that you created in the previous section. Click Submit. Your new story will be on the bottom of your backlog and the Epic that you created will be on the list of Epics in the Epic filter. Select the Epic that you created previously. Click Create Story. Once the new Story form loads, observe that the Epic field is filled in with the Epic you created.
7. 8. In the Short description field, enter a name for the story, and then click Submit. Once you are back on the Backlog Planning page, in the Epic filter, select the All stories radio button. General UI Navigation Single Value Metrics Along the top of your backlog, you will see three single-score metric reports: Stories in total, No story points, and No acceptance criteria. These metrics are both informational as well as a filter on your backlog. Click the No story points report. Your Backlog list should now only show stories that have not been sized ( Points is empty). Click the Stories in total report to change the Backlog list back to showing all stories. Configuration Options Clicking the icon in the upper-right corner of the Backlog Planning page expands the configuration options for the Configuration page. You can turn the Epic filter on and off, as well as choose which fields appear in the Backlog list.
Bulk Updates via Standard Lists The Backlog list is a customer component designed for Product Owners to manage the ranking of their backlog. In Kingston, it does not support bulk updates (other than ranking bulk updates) and the list of fields that you can display is limited. In the upper-right corner of the Backlog list is a link to display the Backlog list as a standard list titled View Standard List. It contains all the stories that are in your backlog, and are in the same order. From the standard list you can do any bulk updates, grouping, reporting, etc. that you need to do as a Product Owner. Bulk Assign Team to Stories 3. First, check to make sure that the Assignment Group column is on the Story list. If it is you can skip to step 5. Click the gear icon. In the Availible column, locate Assignment Group and add it to the Selected column.
4. 5. 6. Click OK. Set the cell as active by clicking the first row's Assignment Group cell. Hold the Shift key and select the first five rows. To edit the field, double-click on the cell. Choose your team and then click the green checkbox to confirm. 3. Close this tab. Sprint Planning The Sprint Planning page is designed to allow teams to manage the stories that have been assigned to them and to plan those stories into their Sprints. You can access the Sprint Planning page from the Agile Board by clicking on the Sprint Planning tab along the top navigation. will need to belong to an agile group to access the Sprint Planning board. Note that you
Create a Sprint In the section "Setting up the Team", we created a Sprint using the related list on the Group record. In this section, we will create a Sprint from the Agile Board. Click Create Sprint. Because we created a Sprint earlier in the Lab, the Short description, Planned start date, and Planned end date fields are already filled in. Review the fields. Click Submit
How the Magic Works When your team has no defined sprints, none of the fields are filled in. Once you have at least one sprint, the Agile Board will: See if the previous Sprint's Short description ends with a number. If it does, add one. Otherwise, take the name and append " 2" and use that as the name of the new Sprint. Check the Planned end date of the previous Sprint. Add one second, and make that the Planned start date value of the new Sprint. 3. Check the length of the previous Sprint. Compute the Planned end date of the new Sprint based on that length. Plan Sprint From the Backlog list for the team: 3. Make sure that the top three stories have been sized. Add points if needed. Select the top three stories. Drag the selected stories into the Sprint you just created. You should see the capacity bar fill part way (or more). If the bar turns orange, you have overloaded your team. Start Sprint Next to the top Sprit in the Sprint list, click Start Sprint. You are automatically taken to the Sprint Board. Sprint Board The Sprint Board is a Visual Task Board that is managed by the Agile Board. It replaces the Story Progress Board that was in previous versions of the Agile Development application. The only activities that a Scrum Master needs to do is add or remove people from the board. Note that you will need to belong to an agile group to access the Sprint Board. A useful configuration change to make to the Visual Task Board is to change the green label to "Ready" and the red label to "Blocked". Click the Labels icon.
3. 4. Rename the green label to Ready. Rename the red label to Blocked. Toggle the other labels off. Complete Sprint Finally, we will complete the Sprint we just started. Navigate back to the Sprint Planning page. On the top Sprint in the Sprint list, click the Complete Sprint button. A dialog box appears with some details: total completed stories and total incomplete stories. When you have incomplete stories, you can move them back into the backlog or into a future Sprint. 5. Select the Backlog. 6. Click Complete Sprint. Other methods of creating and viewing stories
There are several ways to create a story in ServiceNow. Stories can be associated to a product or a project, but this is not mandatory. Note: In order to see stories, you must be added to an agile team first. To edit stories, the scrum team member role must be provided. Create a story in one of these ways: Option Action From Agile Board Navigate to Agile Development > Agile Board. Click the Backlog Planning tab or Sprint Planning tab. 3. Click Create Story. From the stories list Navigate to Agile Development > All Stories. Click New in the record list. From the release backlog Navigate to Release Backlog. Click New in the record list. From an enhancement record Navigate to Agile Development > Enhancements. Open the required enhancement. 3. Right-click the header and select Create story. The product owner reviews enhancement requests and decides which ones require stories. From a defect record Navigate to Agile Development > Defects. Open the defect record. 3. Right-click the header and select Create story. From a product, release, sprint, theme, or epic form Select the Stories related list and click New. Fill in the fields, as appropriate. Note: Some of the fields on the story form may already be filled up depending on from where the story is created. Table Story form fields Field Number Theme Epic Type Classification Description A system generated number for the story. Theme associated with the story. A theme can have one or more stories, but a story can belong to only one theme at a time. Select the theme for this story from a list of themes associated with the selected Product. Epic associated with the story. An epic can have one or more stories, but a story can belong to only one epic at a time. Select an epic for this story from the epics associated with the selected Product. The type of story: Development Documentation Spike, for example, research activity The type of development the story involves. The default is Featu re. This field has no connection to the Defect and Enhancement fields in the Related Records tab. State Current state of the story. The default for a new story is Draft. Points Priority Product The number of points indicating the estimated effort required to complete the story. A larger point value indicates that a greater amount of effort is required. The priority assigned to the story. A product owner can use priorities to rank stories in the planning board. The product with which this story is associated. This field is required if the story is part of product.
Release Assignment group Sprint Assigned to Demand Project Project phase Blocked Short description Description Acceptance criteria Work notes The release with which this story is associated. The release can be from the releases associated with the selected Product. The group to which the story belongs. The sprint with which this story is associated. This field becomes active when an Assignment group is selected. The user who is working on the story. Users on this list have appropriate scrum roles. The demand with which this story is associated. When the demand is converted to project, the demand stories move from demand to project. The project with which this story is associated. This field is required if the story is executed as part of a project. The name of the agile project phase with which this story is associated. This field becomes active when a Project is selected. If a project has only one phase, then the story automatically gets tagged to the only phase. Note: An agile phase can have stories belonging to more than one group. An indicator that shows that there are issues that are preventing the story from making progress. Clear the check box if there are no blocking issues. A brief description of the story. A more detailed description of the story. The functional criteria or testing results required to move this story to a state of Complete. Notes about the work being performed for this story. 3. Result Related lists Defect The defect associated with the story. This is a reference field from the Defect [rm_defect] table. This field is required if the story is created for a defect. Click the magnifier icon in this field to display the defects created and to open a new defect. Only users with the feature_user role can open a defect. The admin must grant the feature_user role to all users who are expected to open defects in the Agile Development application. This is the only location in the Agile Development application where records from this table appear. Enhancement The enhancement associated with the story. This is a reference field from the Enhancement [rm_enhancement] table. This field is required if the story is created for an enhancement. Click Submit. The story is created and the form reopens with related lists. The story is listed in the respective backlog list depending on the fields filled in the story form. What to do next Click the magnifier icon in this field to display the enhancement requests created and to open a new enhancement. Only users with the feature_user role can open an enhancement. The admin must grant the feature_user role to all users who are expected to open enhancement requests in the Agile Development application. This is the only location in the Agile Development application where records from this table appear. Create the necessary scrum tasks for this story, or specify one or more stories where the current story is dependent using these related lists and links.
Field Description Related lists Scrum Tasks Lists the scrum tasks created for the story. Click New to create a scrum task. Prerequisite Stories Lists the stories that must be completed before the current story can be completed. Click Edit to add prerequisite stories. Dependent Stories Lists the stories that depend on the current story. Click Edit to add a dependent story. Related links Add Scrum Tasks Allows to add multiple tasks tasks to the current story from the Add Scrum Tasks dialog box. Fill in the fields and then click OK. The tasks are added to the Scrum Tasks related list.