The Scrum Guide has entirely moved away from using the word “commit” in relation to the Sprint Planning ceremony and favors having the Development Team “forecast the functionality that will be developed during the Sprint.” When this shift was made back in 2011, the reasoning given was a combination of semantic meaning of the words and perception that a commitment overly burdens the Team to deliver at all costs and inherently compromise quality.

I think it is very unfortunate that there is a pull away from the team making a commitment. At some point, asking a high performing Development Team to determine what it can commit to deliver in 2 weeks is, in practice, not a hardship for the Team. In fact, I have been preaching the importance of building a “Culture of Commitment” in organizations for many years now and how organizations that embody this culture deeply have some of the highest performing teams. More importantly, they are the organizations that seem capable to deliver the most business value on a continuous basis while sustaining engaged, long-running teams.

In this article series, I will explain what Culture of Commitment looks like in high performing organizations and why it is important. Additionally, I will explore how the Agile / Scrum foundations, as well as the right environmental factors, can support a pervasive Culture of Commitment in your organization.

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