Everyone needs to have a common understanding of when work is done to ensure transparency.
The Definition-of-Done is a promise of quality
The DoD is derived from the idea of the Acceptance Criteria of Backlog Items. It describes which types of results must be present and which work must have been performed in order for the Backlog Item to be considered completed. Since this can be described only insufficiently in the short description of a Backlog Item, we formulate the Acceptance Criteria separately at the Backlog Item.
Now, for the same types of Backlog Ttem, the same or similar Acceptance Criteria will always arise. These can then be formulated as entries in the Definition-of-Done for these Backlog Item Types.
Each individual Backlog Item Type should therefore have a Definition-of-Done that represents the completion standard of the work performed on it. The Definition-of-Done therefore corresponds in its essence to the process descriptions and “standard operation procedures” of a classic organization, albeit in a highly condensed form. Often, the documents to be created for the product development process are also defined via the DoD. Even if the required documents are defined as system parts to be delivered, a DoD is required for them.
In the P4 framework, there is a Definition-of-Done for each organizational unit at each level:
- For each team, a Team DoD
- For each cluster a Cluster-DoD
- For the entire organization an Organization DoD