How – How to Describe an Agile Pattern

Agile Patterns can be described in many ways.  A good way is to break it down into two parts. 

1^st: Standards – the critical elements of the Agile Pattern; 

without these the Agile Pattern cannot exist

e.g. Scrum has 3 standard Roles: Scrum Master, Product Owner, Team; 5 standard Ceremonies: Sprints, Sprint Planning, Stand-ups, Sprint Reviews, Sprint Retrospectives; and 3 standard Artifacts: Product Backlog, Sprint Backlog, Potentially Shippable Increment.

2^nd: Guidelines – the suggested but optional elements that support 

the effectiveness of the Agile Pattern

e.g. Scrum has Guidelines for each standard part, for example the Potentially Shippable Increment needs a Definition of Done. 

BTW - If more detail needs to be defined for the standard elements or the guidelines, consider answering the seven questions: why, who, what, when, where, how, and which.  For more info see previous posts on this blog

DONE.