Backlog refinement (backlog grooming): how to run it

The Scrum Guide describes product backlog refinement as breaking down and further defining backlog items into smaller, more precise ones. In practice, it's 4 jobs:

• Remove what no longer matters.
• Split what's too big to finish in a sprint.
• Clarify what's vague: add a user story, acceptance criteria, and answers to open questions.
• Order what's left, most important first, and size it.

They're the same thing. "Backlog grooming" was the common name for years. The Scrum Guide used "refinement" from 2013 onwards, and most teams have followed, partly because the old word has unpleasant meanings in British English. Use whichever your team knows, but expect to see "refinement" in anything written recently.

• How often: most teams hold one session a week, or 1 or 2 a sprint. Some refine a little every day instead.
• How long: 45 to 60 minutes. Earlier editions of the Scrum Guide suggested refinement take no more than 10% of the team's time, which is still a useful ceiling.
• Who: the product owner, who decides the order, and the people who'll do the work, who know what's involved. Bring in a specialist when an item needs one.
• How far ahead: enough ready work for the next 1 or 2 sprints. Refining further ahead is often wasted, because plans change.

1. 5 minutes: remove. Scan the bottom of the backlog. Delete or archive anything nobody would miss.
2. 25 minutes: the top items. Take the next 5 to 10 items in order. For each, ask what's unclear, add acceptance criteria, and split it if it's too big.
3. 10 minutes: size. Give each refined item a rough size, so the team can see how much fits in a sprint.
4. 5 minutes: order and questions. The product owner adjusts the order. Anything blocked by an open question gets an owner to find the answer before next time.

When the team could start it tomorrow without asking anyone a question. Many teams write this down as a definition of ready: a short checklist an item must meet before it's pulled into a sprint, like "has acceptance criteria" and "fits in a sprint".

• A backlog that only grows. If nothing is ever removed, the backlog becomes a list of everything anyone ever said. Remove freely; good ideas come back.
• Refining the whole backlog. Detail on items 6 months away is wasted. Refine the top.
• The product owner alone. Without the people doing the work, sizes are guesses and the questions come up later, in the sprint.
• Turning it into planning. Refinement gets items ready. Choosing what goes into the sprint is sprint planning.

In craaft, the backlog is a column, and refinement is mostly dragging and editing cards in it:

• Keep the Backlog column in order: the top card is the next to be refined and the next to be worked on.
• Add acceptance criteria as a checklist on each card, and a size.
• Archive what you remove instead of deleting it. Archived cards still come up in search.
• Tag cards that are refined, like "ready", and filter by the tag in sprint planning.
• Start from the sprint planning template, which has a Backlog column ahead of To Do.