Sixty ChatGPT Prompts for Scrum Masters and Product Owners

A prompt engineering guide covering the basics, services to enhance your prompts, and how to use ChatGPT to generate prompts. (Yub, that works, too.)

Stefan Wolpers

CORE ·

May. 15, 23 · Tutorial

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ChatGPT can be an excellent tool for those who know how to create prompts. The simplest form of prompting ChatGPT is to feed it the task and ask for results. However, this approach is unlikely to trigger the best response from the model.

Instead, invest more time in prompt engineering, and provide ChatGPT with a better context of the situation, desired outcomes, data, constraints, etc. The following article offers a primer to creating ChatGPT prompts for Scrum practitioners to get you started running. You will learn the following:

Prompt engineering basics
Prompt engineering with services like PromptPerfect
Using ChatGPT for prompt engineering. (Yub, that works, too.)

Setting up the Session

I ran the session on ChatGPT on Thursday, April 6, 2023, from 13:45 pm CEST to 16:15 pm CEST on the model GPT-4. (This requires upgrading to ChatGPT Plus.) I did not apply Grammarly to ChatGPT’s answers.

Picking the Low-Hanging ChatGPT Fruit

Let us reduce time-to-value by starting with some simple, ready-to-go prompts for Scrum Masters, Product Owners, and Developers that you can use out-of-the-box, that will simplify your life as an agile practitioner:

Example ChatGPT Prompts for Scrum Masters

Prompt: “I want you to act as an experienced Scrum Master. Please [insert your task here.]”

Examples of Tasks:

Provide tips for facilitating effective Sprint Planning meetings.
Summarize the outcome of the Daily Scrum with the following data: [Your data.]
Design a Retrospective.
Design a Retrospective with stakeholders from [Stakeholder departments.]
List strategies for resolving team conflicts and promoting a healthy work environment.
Recommend activities to make Sprint Retrospectives engaging and productive.
Summarize the outcome of the Retrospective with the following data: [Your data.]
Create tips for coaching and supporting the Product Owner in Product Backlog refinement.
Explain the benefits and drawbacks of different estimation techniques.
Suggest how to help the Scrum team balance technical debt and new feature development.
Design a Sprint board.
Design a Sprint board considering the following [your process information].
Create a Definition of Done.
Create a Definition of Done considering the following [your criteria].
Create a workshop on Scrum for new stakeholders.
Explain [Agile or Scrum concept] and best practices for implementation.
Identify common Sprint anti-patterns and their solutions.
Suggest techniques to improve team communication and collaboration.
Suggest resources for continuous learning and improvement as a Scrum Master.
Provide guidance on handling external dependencies and stakeholder engagement.

Example ChatGPT Prompts for Product Owners

Prompt: “I want you to act as an experienced Product Owner. Please [insert your task here.]”

Examples of Tasks:

List best practices for Product Backlog refinement.
Prioritize user stories by value and complexity: [Your user story list].
Improve the description of the following user story: [Your user story].
Split the following user story into tasks: [Your user story].
List acceptance criteria for the following user story: [Your user story].
Identify risks & dependencies for the following feature: [Your feature].
Determine KPIs for the following feature: [Your feature].
Create a script for the following user interview session: [Your goal, what to test, etc.]
List user interview questions for the following feature: [Your feature].
Summarize the following feedback: [your user feedback and usage data].
Analyze the following hypothesis for assumptions: [Your hypothesis].
Run a pre-mortem and list five reasons why the following feature won’t work: [Your feature description].
Suggest product names for the following product: [product description].
Analyse existing competition for the following product: [product description].
Suggest five alternative product roadmaps based on the following hypotheses: [Your hypotheses].
Suggest strategies to handle scope creep with regard to our Product Goal: [Your Product Goal].
Balance technical debt and new feature development based on: [Your work item list].
Improve team-stakeholder communication practices.
Create a workshop on product management in Scrum for new stakeholders.
Create a list of interview questions for Product Owner candidates.

Example ChatGPT Prompts for Developers

Prompt: “I want you to act as an experienced Developer. Please [insert your task here.]”

Examples of Tasks:

Explain [programming concept] and best practices.
Create a code snippet for [functionality] in [language].
Optimize performance: [paste code].
Find security vulnerabilities: [paste code…].
Compare [tech A] and [tech B]: performance, ease, scalability.
Identify pitfalls and best practices for [language/framework].
Debug [error] in [language/framework].
Set up [tool/environment] guide.
Curate resources to learn [language/tech].
List the pros and cons of [pattern] in [project/scenario].

How To Create Advanced ChatGPT Prompts

The following advanced ChatGPT prompts comprise several elements:

First, define in what capacity ChatGPT shall interact with the prompts; for example, as a Scrum Master.
Then, sketch the situation and suggest what knowledge ChatGPT shall consider answering.
As a third step, point to helpful practices.
Optionally, you can also prescribe the output format, for example, a list format.
Finally, describe the scenario and place your first request.

Also, consider experimenting with labeling the different prompt sections; for example, with “Context,” “Goal,” or “Response Structure.”

Here are three examples of advanced ChatGPT prompts for Scrum practitioners:

Example 1 — The Scrum Master: A Conflict Is Brewing at a Retrospective

An example of an advanced Scrum Master ChatGPT prompt:

I want you to act as a Scrum Master.

I will describe a conflict situation in a Scrum team. You will use your knowledge of teaching, coaching, mentoring, communication, and conflict resolution to provide me with suggestions on how to solve the conflict.

Your suggestions include surveys, talks, interviews, team meetings, games, exercises, or other parties like stakeholders or line managers, and other useful practices.

My first request is: Tension has been mounting among the members of your Scrum team for quite some time. The stakeholders have unrealistic expectations regarding future Increments and are dissatisfied with the team’s performance. The technology your Scrum team has built over time is increasingly less reliable, and technical debt is notably increasing. Shortly into this Sprint’s Retrospective, the team members start arguing loudly and passing blame.

How would you handle the situation?

Depending on the answer to the model, you may want to follow up with another prompt, for example:

Is there anything else I should know?
How can Scrum Values help to solve the situation?
How might the Scrum Master have contributed to the situation?

Example 2 — The Product Owner: The Sales Team Sells Unauthorized Features To Meet Its Quota

An example of an advanced Product Owner ChatGPT prompt:

I want you to act as a Product Owner.

I will describe a conflict situation within the organization. Then, you will use your knowledge of product discovery, product management, innovation, collaboration, alignment, stakeholder management, expectation management, communication, and conflict resolution to provide me with suggestions on how to solve the conflict.

Your suggestions include surveys, talks, interviews, stakeholder meetings, training classes, educational offerings, exercises, workshops like user story mapping and value stream mapping, or including other parties like business analysts, subject matter experts, line managers, or C-level members, and other useful practices.

My first request is: “Your sales team sells non-existing features to customers to meet its quarterly quotas. They also agree on fixed delivery dates for these new features and accept contractual penalties in the case of non-delivery. However, at no time does the sales team reach out to you as a Product Owner in advance to align their need to meet sales quotas with the overall product strategy, roadmap, or current Product Goal. How would you handle this situation?”

Depending on the answer to the model, you may want to follow up with another prompt, for example:

Is there anything else I should know?
How might the Product Owner have contributed to the situation?
Would a typical incentive structure for sales teams be relevant to the problem?

Example 3 — The Developer: Dying in Beauty by Sticking to the Definition of Done?

An example of an advanced Developer ChatGPT prompt:

I want you to act as a Developer on a self-managing Scrum team, responsible for creating all Increments.

I will describe a conflict with your Scrum team’s Product Owner and some stakeholders. You will use your knowledge of programming, developing software, extreme programming, technical excellence, innovation, creating viable technology stacks, technological longevity, technical debt, quality assurance, quality management, Scrum, the importance of the Definition of Done, stakeholder management, collaboration, communication, and conflict resolution to provide me with suggestions on how to solve the conflict.

Your suggestions include discussions, surveys, talks, interviews, stakeholder meetings, workshops, exercises, or including other parties like subject matter experts, technology leaders, line managers, or C-level members, and other useful practices.

My first request is: “Your startup is running out of cash quickly. The organization would need to meet a product milestone to receive a new funding round from venture capital firms. However, meeting this funding requirement with the remaining runway would also mean abandoning the quality standard defined by your Scrum team’s Definition of Done. The stakeholders do not see it as a problem; they want to take the risk but not go out of business due to a lack of funds. Meeting the milestone is the only way for the startup to survive. On the other side, abandoning the Definition of Done violates the first principles of Scrum. How would you address the conflict?”

Depending on the answer to the model, you may want to follow up with another prompt, for example:

Is there anything else I should know?
How might the Developers have contributed to the situation?

Using PromptPerfect To Help With Your Prompt Engineering

Or course, there are already services available that support prompt engineering. You start with your initial prompt, define some settings, and the service will return an improved prompt you can use for ChatGPT or other large language models (LLMs), large models (LMs). and LMOps.

As an example of such a service, I used PromptPerfect for all the following exercises:

Original prompt: I want you to act as an experienced Scrum Master. Please design a Retrospective.

PromptPerfect suggestion: As an experienced Scrum Master, your task is to design a retrospective for a team that has just completed a sprint. The retrospective should provide the team with an opportunity to reflect on their performance during the sprint and identify areas for improvement going forward. Please structure your retrospective around three key questions: What went well? What could have gone better? What will we do differently next time? Your retrospective should include specific activities or exercises that encourage open communication and constructive feedback among team members. You may also want to consider incorporating visual aids, such as charts or diagrams, to help illustrate key points. Finally, please provide clear instructions on how to facilitate the retrospective and any materials needed for each activity or exercise.

Original prompt: I want you to act as an experienced Scrum Master. Please help create a Definition of Done.

PromptPerfect suggestion: As an experienced Scrum Master, your task is to help create a Definition of Done for the project at hand. The Definition of Done should clearly outline the criteria that must be met in order for a product backlog item to be considered complete and ready for release. This includes factors such as functionality, quality, performance, and security. Your response should provide specific guidelines on what constitutes “done” for each aspect of the project, including any relevant metrics or tests that need to be passed. You should also encourage collaboration between team members to ensure that everyone understands and agrees with the Definition of Done. Please note that your response should be flexible enough to allow for various relevant and creative definitions based on the unique needs and goals of the project.

The Meta-Level: Using ChatGPT for Prompt Ideas

Of course, you can always use ChatGPT itself to make suggestions for working with ChatGPT. Ultimately, for this exercise, we want ChatGPT to create a Retrospective exercise:

Example 1: Using ChatGPT 4.0 Directly

Prompt: I want you to act as an experienced Scrum Master. You want to use ChatGPT to create a new Retrospective exercise. What prompts do you suggest a Scrum Master use to help ChatGPT create the best Retrospective workshop ever?

ChatGPT 4.0 Response:

As an experienced Scrum Master, I would suggest the following prompts to utilize ChatGPT for creating a highly engaging and effective Retrospective workshop:

“Design a unique Retrospective exercise focused on improving team communication and collaboration.”
“Create a Retrospective activity that encourages team members to identify and share their proudest achievements during the last Sprint.”
“Propose a Retrospective game that helps the team uncover hidden issues or bottlenecks affecting their performance.”
“Develop a Retrospective exercise centered around learning from failures and turning them into actionable improvements.”
“Suggest a creative Retrospective format that promotes team bonding and a sense of unity.”
“Design a Retrospective activity that helps the team analyze the balance between technical debt and new feature development.”
“Create an interactive Retrospective exercise that involves both individual reflection and group discussion.”
“Propose a Retrospective format that encourages team members to discuss and address cross-functional collaboration challenges.”
“Develop a Retrospective exercise that allows the team to explore innovative ways to streamline their Agile processes.”
“Suggest a fun and engaging Retrospective activity that reinforces the importance of continuous improvement and learning.”

These prompts can help a Scrum Master leverage ChatGPT’s creative capabilities to design a Retrospective workshop that addresses various aspects of team performance, collaboration, and continuous improvement in an engaging and effective way.

Example 2: Using ChatGPT 4.0 With a Fine-Tuned Prompt From PromptPerfect

Let’s take the next step in prompt engineering: I took the previous prompt, see above, and used PromptPerfect to improve it. Consequently, the new prompt now comprises several paragraphs:

Prompt by PromptPerfect:

As an experienced Scrum Master, your task is to collaborate with ChatGPT to create a new Retrospective exercise that will help improve team performance. Your prompts should focus on generating creative and innovative ideas for the retrospective workshop.

Please provide specific guidelines on what aspects of the project you would like to address in the retrospective, such as communication, collaboration, or productivity. Additionally, please suggest potential activities or exercises that could be used during the retrospective to encourage participation and engagement from all team members.

Your response should also include clear instructions on how to facilitate the retrospective exercise and ensure that it meets its objectives. Please highlight any potential challenges or issues that may arise during the retrospective and provide strategies for addressing them.

Overall, your goal is to work collaboratively with ChatGPT to develop a comprehensive and effective Retrospective exercise that will help improve team performance and promote continuous improvement.

Feeding the enhanced prompt to ChatGPT results in significantly more elaborate instructions on how to create ChatGPT prompts:

ChatGPT 4.0 Response:

To collaborate with ChatGPT to create an innovative Retrospective exercise that focuses on improving team performance, communication, and collaboration, consider using the following prompts:

“Design a Retrospective activity that enables team members to reflect on communication challenges experienced during the Sprint and propose solutions.”
“Create an interactive exercise that helps identify areas for improvement in team collaboration and promotes sharing of best practices.”
“Suggest an engaging Retrospective exercise that helps the team analyze their productivity levels and discuss ways to optimize their processes.”

Next, provide guidelines on specific aspects to address:

Encourage open and honest communication about challenges faced during the Sprint.
Promote sharing of best practices and lessons learned among team members.
Identify process improvements to boost team productivity and streamline workflows.

Suggested activities or exercises:

“Facilitate a ‘Speedboat’ exercise where team members identify anchors (challenges) and engines (success factors) related to communication and collaboration.”
“Organize a ‘Fishbowl’ discussion where team members take turns discussing their experiences and insights related to productivity and process improvements.”

Instructions for facilitating the Retrospective exercise:

Set the stage by explaining the objectives of the Retrospective and encouraging open and honest feedback.
Introduce the chosen activity or exercise, and provide clear instructions on how to participate.
Act as a neutral facilitator, ensuring that everyone has an opportunity to share their thoughts and ideas.
Guide the team in identifying action items and assigning ownership for implementation.
Close the Retrospective by summarizing the key takeaways and next steps.

Potential challenges and strategies for addressing them:

Challenge: Team members may be hesitant to share their thoughts or concerns. Strategy: Foster a safe and trusting environment by emphasizing the importance of psychological safety and reinforcing the “no-blame” culture.
Challenge: Dominant voices may overshadow quieter team members. Strategy: As the facilitator, ensure equal participation by inviting quieter members to share their thoughts and encouraging active listening.

By working collaboratively with ChatGPT, you can develop a comprehensive and effective Retrospective exercise that addresses the key aspects of team performance, communication, and collaboration, fostering continuous improvement.

Finally, Generating the Retrospective Exercise With ChatGPT

Now that we have a better understanding of what kind of ChatGPT prompts may support the generation of a Retrospective let us run a simple test:

Follow-up prompt: Based on your last answer, please create a new Retrospective exercise.

ChatGPT 4.0 Response:

Set the stage (5 minutes)
- Explain the objectives of the Retrospective: improving team communication and collaboration and identifying process improvements.
- Emphasize the importance of open and honest feedback and a no-blame culture.
Individual reflection (10 minutes)
- Ask team members to individually reflect on the following questions:
  1. What went well in terms of communication and collaboration during the Sprint?
  2. What challenges did we face in communication and collaboration?
  3. How can we improve our processes to boost productivity?
Collaboration Constellation creation (20 minutes)
- On a large piece of paper or whiteboard, draw a constellation with each star representing a team member.
- Ask each team member to write their answers to the reflection questions on sticky notes (one idea per note) and place them on the constellation around their corresponding star.
Group discussion and clustering (20 minutes)
- Facilitate a group discussion where team members take turns presenting their sticky notes.
- Encourage team members to ask questions and share their thoughts on each other’s ideas.
- As the ideas are presented, group similar ideas together, creating clusters on the constellation.
Identifying action items (15 minutes)
- As a group, discuss each cluster of ideas and identify potential action items to address the challenges and opportunities for improvement.
- Assign ownership and timelines for each action item to ensure follow-through.
Close the Retrospective (5 minutes)
- Summarize the key takeaways, action items, and next steps.
- Thank everyone for their participation and encourage continuous improvement.

By conducting the Collaboration Constellation Retrospective exercise, you can facilitate open and honest conversations, address communication and collaboration challenges, and identify process improvements to enhance team performance.

Kudos, ChatGPT; this Retrospective exercise draft is a good outcome, given the prompting engineering effort for this exercise was less than 10 minutes.

Conclusion

I believe that ChatGPT and its competitors will become standard tools for many knowledge workers, Scrum people, and agile practitioners in general included. Consequently, honing your prompt engineering skills is an excellent investment. Hopefully, this article will entice you to explore the matter: Use it or fall behind — it won’t go away!

What prompt engineering techniques, hacks, and jailbreaks do you use for ChatGPT?

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