Adventures in Project Management
Scrumples! - finish our dream house
Scrumples! - finish our dream house is a fun and noisy board game that teaches the basics of using a sprint board. Players compete to finish renovating their dream house in 3 sprints before their extended family visit, balancing competing user expectations, an overwhelming set of requirements and unpredictable progress. Game play includes counters, dice and bicycle horns. It works best with 3-4 people in a team and 2-4 teams competing and needs a referee to co-ordinate the chaos as it rapidly gets very noisy as everyone finds their inner competitive child! It takes 60-90 minutes to play. This scenario is designed to be part of the agile in a day training course (although works just as well as a standalone game).
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The scenario
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Congratulations. Against the advice of your city-living extended family you purchased a run down cottage in the countryside and have been renovating it with the proceeds from your first novel. After months of hard work, the cottage has functioning plumbing, heating, electricity and broadband. You have finished the bathrooms and kitchen but have basically been camping in your house. You have no furniture, white goods, flooring, internal doors or curtains. Nothing is decorated. The good news is that the insurance money has come in (a fire in the storage unit destroyed all your possessions); the bad news is to prove your family wrong you have invited them all over for a weekend in the winter. Your cottage is big enough, but it will be a squeeze with elderly relatives, sulky teenagers, noisy toddlers, harassed parents and a few dogs creating a perfect storm of a family gathering. You have 6 weeks before the doorbell rings (if you have installed one by then). Meanwhile your publisher will only pay the advance on your next book when she receives a draft manuscript (and title!) and you need this additional money to kit out your writing shed. Let's Scrumple!
Make your own Scrumples!
Things to print
Print 1 copy A4 single page, paper or preferably 300gsm white satin card
Print 1 copy A4 single page, paper or preferably 300gsm white satin card
Print 1 copy A1 single page, paper, per team (eg print qty 4)
Print 1 copy A4 (2 pages, 2 feature cards per page), paper or preferably 300gsm coloured card per team (eg print 1 copy on red, green, blue, yellow card to provide enough for 4 teams), then chop each page into 2 feature cards
Print 1 copy A4 (13 pages, 8 task cards per page), paper or preferably 300gsm coloured card per team (eg print 1 copy on red, green, blue, yellow card to provide enough for 4 teams), then chop each page into 8 task cards
Things to buy
