In my early days with scrum, I came across the concept of "Definition of Done" or DoD and "Acceptance Criteria", in the beginning, I thought both are the same and its just synonyms, but later on, I discovered that they have some differences, can you name some you know? Saving Changes...
There isn't a major difference, and maybe my colleagues here can elaborate more but here is how I understand it:
Acceptance criteria are story specific requirements that must be met for the story to be completed. Acceptance criteria are often added during backlog refinement or during the sprint planning meeting.
The definition of done is a list of things that need to be completed for any story to be considered done. It covers what the team feels is necessary to consider any story done.
I fully agree Saving Changes...
Thomas WalentaGlobal Project Economy ExpertHackenheim, Germany
Acceptance criteria can exist on all levels, from contract, project charter down to specific deliverables, represented by stories in the case of Scrum. They exist in all kind of projects and are at least approved by the customer, if not defined by them.
DoD is a Scrum specific artifact and - as others said - process specific. They are defined and owned by the Scrum team. Saving Changes...
Craeg StrongCTO| Savant Financial Technologies IncNew York, Ny, United States
I recently took and passed the Professional Scrum Master II certification, and this question is very much like the questions on the exam. The Definition of Done is ideally **NOT** team specific. The Definition of Done should be common across all teams. Sometimes the Definition of Done must be relaxed for a given team, because they are unable to meet the organization's DoD due to certain constraints such as heavyweight legacy software, immature tool set, etc.
Allow me to quote from the Scrum Guide 2020:
"If the Definition of Done for an increment is part of the standards of the organization, all Scrum Teams must follow it as a minimum. If it is not an organizational standard, the Scrum Team must create a Definition of Done appropriate for the product."
Acceptance criteria are a part of a well-formed Definition of Done.
However, DoD goes well beyond acceptance criteria. It usually includes things like: well-formed user story, UX artifacts, code checked in to source control, peer review completed, build successful, code coverage % the same or higher (no reduction), documentation updated, online help updated, training materials updated, etc.
I think some of the confusion arises due to the use of the word "criteria." Acceptance criteria are usually translated directly to a combination of manual and automated acceptance tests.
It is likely that some people use the word "acceptance criteria" in a different way than the way I have defined it above. I think that is unfortunate, because it leads to ambiguity. Ambiguity leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.... Saving Changes...
I'd disagree that a specific set of DoD guidelines is universally applicable within an organization. An organization will have many different types of projects and teams and the DoD needs to reflect that to be useful. Projects which are external-facing or those requiring external validation are likely to have different specific guidelines than those which are purely internal.
There are likely to be certain common guidelines across team DoD's such as "Acceptance criteria should have been met & verified" but others should be specific to the context of the situation.
Kiron Saving Changes...
Mohua GhoshScrum Master Manager| AccentureHyderabad, Telangana, India
Feb 19, 2018 1:12 AM
Replying to Rami Kaibni
...
There isn't a major difference, and maybe my colleagues here can elaborate more but here is how I understand it:
Acceptance criteria are story specific requirements that must be met for the story to be completed. Acceptance criteria are often added during backlog refinement or during the sprint planning meeting.
The definition of done is a list of things that need to be completed for any story to be considered done. It covers what the team feels is necessary to consider any story done.
I totally agree both Acceptance Criteria and Definition of Done are completely different.The responses seem to have addressed it fully. Saving Changes...
Done means completed, no more tasks to be performed on that specific deliverable (e.g. to make it usable or transferred) (hence the question should be: done of what); acceptance criteria is as the conditions to accept the deliverable are met Saving Changes...
As an input from the customer, AC is developed and recorded at the user story level by the PO and the DT.
AC is expressed in business terms.
AC is applied to product backlog items.
AC comes from XP world.
DoD come from Scrum World.
DoD is a transparent commitment and compliance to increment quality.
DoD is developed by the entire scum team in technical, process and organizational terms.
DoD is applied to the increment.
The DoD is updated during Retrospective meetings.
Improvement commitments can be input to DoD update.
If the organization has already a DoD, the project team use it as a minimum DoD for the current project.
If multiple teams are working on the same product, a single DoD is agreed-upon and used.
If teams are integrating parts of big product, each team craft his own DoD in respect with the Integrated DoD. Saving Changes...
"The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret of getting started is breaking your complex overwhelming tasks into small manageable tasks, and then starting on the first one."
