The concept of Definition of Done always seems to me very simple. But for some reason, many organizations are struggling with it. So, let’s check it out. Definition of Done is an agreement among Scrum team about when we are internally done, ready for a Sprint review. It’s like a quality checklist of what needs to be done before we show it to the customers. The weakest definition of done is “It works on my computer”. You can do better than that. Usually, it would include automated testing, peer review, creating documentation, and agreement on which environment it needs to run like a test environment, production, etc.
Keep in mind that the more strict your Definition of Done is, the more expensive it is to build a feature. So, it depends on what kind of business you’re in. If you’re a life critical or mission critical product, you need a higher Definition of Done then if you’re just building Facebook games. If you have a bistro on the corner, you have a lower Definition of Done than if you plan to have a Michelin star restaurant. The quality costs you. And actually the lack of quality costs you even more. So you need to find a balance.
Now, what happens if you don’t have a Definition of Done defined at all? In general, it’s a mess because you don’t know what is working. You don’t know what still needs to be done. Having a Definition of Done brings predictability and define quality. So spending a time and making clear agreement with your team will pay back.