4. Challenge 2: Defining Team Entrance and Exit Criteria

It has been said that if you don’t know where you are going, all roads lead there. Many teams operate as if they do not want a defined destination. “All roads lead there” is a perfect scapegoat: When a team finishes a project, it can declare victory no matter what, because there is no way to determine whether or not it met its objective.

Entrance criteria define basic circumstances that must exist before a team can begin work, as well as all information the team will need at the start. Exit criteria define the attributes of the deliverables that the team must produce. For example, if you were going to bake a cake, entrance criteria could include a recipe, ingredients, measuring cups and ...

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