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📅 Ceremonies & Cadence

All recurring meetings, frequency, duration, and participants

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Business Attendance Guide

Not all ceremonies require business/product owner attendance. This guide clarifies which meetings need cross-timezone participation and which are team-internal.

Principle: Minimize timezone overlap meetings. Business attends only where input or approval is essential.

Ceremonies Requiring Business/Product Owner

Ceremony Frequency Duration Why Business Needed
Sprint Review/Demo Every 2 weeks 60 min See delivered value, provide feedback, accept/reject stories
Backlog Refinement Weekly or as needed 60 min Clarify requirements, answer questions, confirm priority
Sprint Planning (first 30 min only) Every 2 weeks 30 min Optional - only for scope/priority questions

Total business time commitment: ~2-3 hours per sprint (every 2 weeks)

Ceremonies NOT Requiring Business

Ceremony Frequency Reason Not Needed
Daily Standup Daily, 15 min Team sync only - blockers escalated async if needed
Retrospective Every 2 weeks Team-only safe space for process improvement
Technical Design As needed Engineering decisions - outcomes shared async
Scrum of Scrums Weekly Cross-team coordination - escalations raised separately

Timezone Recommendations

With teams distributed across US and India (10-13 hour difference), we recommend:

  • Overlap window: India morning / US evening (9-10 AM IST = ~10:30 PM EST / 7:30 PM PST)
  • Alternative: India evening / US morning (6-7 PM IST = ~7:30 AM EST / 4:30 AM PST)
  • Max overlap time: 2 hours per week for business stakeholders

Async Alternatives

To reduce live meeting burden, use async communication for:

  • Recorded demos: Loom videos of completed features for async review
  • Sprint summaries: Written end-of-sprint report with key outcomes
  • Slack updates: Quick status updates and minor decisions
  • PRD comments: Async feedback on documents before refinement sessions

Complete Meeting Schedule

Activity Frequency Duration Participants
Stakeholder Refinement Bi-weekly 1-2 hrs PO, FL, TA, Stakeholders
Design Review Weekly 1 hr PO, FL, TA, UX/UI
PRD Creation Per feature 2-4 hrs PO, FL, TA, Stakeholders
PRD Review/Sign-off Per feature 1 hr PO, FL, TA, Stakeholders, QA
Sprint Planning Every 2 weeks 2-4 hrs FL, TA, TL, PC, Full Team
Daily Standup Daily 15 min TL, PC, Dev Team, QA
Scrum of Scrums Weekly 30 min FL, TA, all Technical Leads
Technical Sync Weekly 1 hr TA, TLs, Senior Devs from each team
Backlog Refinement Mid-sprint 1-2 hrs PO, TL, PC, Full Team
Sprint Review Every 2 weeks 1-2 hrs FL, TA, TL, PC, Team + Stakeholders
Retrospective Every 2 weeks 1 hr TL, PC, Team
Release Coordination End of sprint 1 hr FL, TA, all TLs, QA
Bug Triage Daily 30 min Support Lead, TA (as needed)
RCA Meeting Per P0 bug 1 hr TA, TL, Developer, QA
Monthly Quality Review Monthly 1 hr FL, TA, QA

Legend: FL = Functional Lead, TA = Technical Architect (cross-team), TL = Technical Lead (team-level, also Scrum Master), PC = Project Coordinator, PO = Product Owner

Sprint Ceremonies Detail

Sprint Planning

When: Day 1 of Sprint

Duration: 2-4 hours

Attendees: PO, Functional Lead, Technical Architect, Technical Lead, PC, Dev Team, QA

Agenda

  1. PO presents prioritized backlog items with designs and PRDs
  2. Team discusses technical approach and dependencies
  3. Stories broken into tasks and estimated
  4. Team commits to Sprint Goal and Sprint Backlog
  5. Capacity confirmed (PTO, meetings)

Daily Standup

When: Every day, same time

Duration: 15 minutes (strict)

Attendees: Technical Lead, PC, Dev Team, QA

Format

Each member answers: What did I complete? What will I work on? Any blockers?

Rules: Start on time. Detailed discussions taken offline. Technical Lead tracks blockers and facilitates.

Backlog Refinement

When: Mid-sprint (Day 4-5)

Duration: 1-2 hours

Purpose: Prepare items for NEXT sprint

Agenda

  • Review upcoming backlog items
  • Clarify requirements, review designs
  • Initial estimation and story splitting
  • Identify technical spikes needed

Sprint Review / Demo

When: Day 10 (last day of sprint)

Duration: 1-2 hours

Attendees: PO, Leads, Team, Stakeholders

Agenda

  • Demo completed features
  • Gather stakeholder feedback
  • PO accepts/rejects stories
  • Discuss backlog adjustments

Retrospective

When: Day 10 (after Review)

Duration: 1 hour

Attendees: Technical Lead, PC, Dev Team, QA

Format

  • What went well? - Celebrate successes
  • What needs improvement? - Identify pain points
  • Action items - 2-3 improvements for next sprint

Cross-Team Ceremonies

Scrum of Scrums

When: Weekly

Duration: 30 minutes

Attendees: Functional Lead, Technical Architect, all Technical Leads

Purpose: Sync across teams, identify dependencies, resolve blockers

Format: Each Technical Lead shares: progress, blockers, dependencies on other teams

Technical Sync

When: Weekly

Duration: 1 hour

Attendees: Technical Architect, Technical Leads, Senior Devs from each team

Purpose: Architecture alignment, shared components, technical debt

Release Coordination

When: End of Sprint

Duration: 1 hour

Attendees: Functional Lead, Technical Architect, all Technical Leads, Quality Engineers

Purpose: Coordinate multi-team releases, integration testing sign-off

Two-Week Sprint Calendar

Day Morning Afternoon
Day 1 (Mon) Sprint Planning (2-4 hrs) Development begins
Day 2-3 Daily Standup (15 min) Development
Day 4 (Thu) Daily Standup Scrum of Scrums (30 min)
Day 5 (Fri) Daily Standup, Backlog Refinement Development
Day 6-7 Daily Standup Development, QA testing
Day 8-9 Daily Standup Development wrap-up, QA testing
Day 10 (Fri) Sprint Review (1-2 hrs) Retrospective (1 hr), Release Coordination