Description
The purpose of the “Roles and Accountabilities” game is to build a common understanding of team roles and accountabilities, and to encourage self-subscription to accountabilities. This game identifies key roles and accountabilities on index cards, then has the team align the accountabilities to each role. While aligning accountabilities, the team can work through ambiguous or contentious accountabilities, and the scrum master may assist by helping team members reach the best conclusion. This game may be applied to different types of teams in an organization where clarity and common understanding are needed. At the conclusion of the game, team members can self-subscribe to roles, and all the accountabilities for each role that have been defined.
Typical Roles
Agile Team
Functional Team
Scrum Master
Desired Behaviors
- 1.
Identify participants that are needed for the roles and accountabilities game.
- 2.
Prepare for the game. Provide large sticky notes for roles, small sticky notes for accountabilities, wall space, and markers.
- 3.
Divide the participants into groups, with two groups being sufficient for smaller teams.
- 4.
Using a timeboxed approach, ask each team to define all potential roles within the team, and post them on large sticky notes.
- 5.
Each group peer reviews the other’s work, and adds/removes/combines roles as appropriate.
- 6.
Each team discusses and defines the accountabilities for each role and records them under the appropriate roles.
- 7.
Each group peer reviews the other’s work, and adds/removes/combines accountabilities as appropriate.
- 8.
Team members can now self-subscribe to roles that have been defined.