| Course | MT247 Agile and Scrum Methodologies |
|---|---|
| Unit | Unit 6 |
| Paper type | Seminar reflection |
| Length | About 810 words, 5 pages double-spaced |
| Format | APA 7 student paper |
| School | Purdue University Global |
| Program | BS in Business Administration |
| Updated | October 2026 |
Free sample paper for MT247 Unit 6
Thirty Points to Fifty-Two: A Unit 6 Seminar Reflection on Whether a Team That Got Faster Got Better
[Student Name]
Purdue University Global
MT247: Agile and Scrum Methodologies
Unit 6 Seminar Reflection
[Instructor Name]
[Date]
The hospital system, its portal team, Larkspur Residential, the classmates and every figure are composite and illustrative; the sources cited are real.
The Case
Our instructor presented the case this way. A hospital system's patient portal team had been running Scrum for a year. Six Sprints ago, the system's leadership began showing each team's velocity on a monthly dashboard shared with executives. Over the next six Sprints the portal team's velocity went 30, 33, 38, 41, 47 and 52 points. Over the same period, two other figures stayed flat: the number of defects that reached patients after release, about four a month, and the number of releases, one every two Sprints. The question for the seminar was simple: had the team improved?
My First Reading
I said yes, and I said it quickly. Velocity had nearly doubled. Teams do get faster as they learn their codebase, remove impediments and work together longer. I had seen our own team's velocity rise from the low teens to around twenty in its first year, and I read the portal team's curve as the same kind of maturing, only steeper. I even suggested that the flat defect count was good news, since the team was doing much more work without more defects.
The Discussion
A classmate who works in hospital finance, Tomas, asked when the dashboard began. When I said six Sprints ago, he named Goodhart's law: when a measure becomes a target, it changes. Goodhart (1984) made the original point about monetary statistics, observing that a figure used to control behavior loses the stable link to what it once measured. Tomas said that in his department, every number that went onto an executive dashboard improved within a quarter, and only some of them reflected anything real.
Then another classmate, Priya, who had read the case appendix more carefully than I had, pointed out that the team's reference story, the item it compared every new item with, had been re-scored from 3 points to 5 halfway through the six Sprints. Nobody had decided to inflate estimates; the team had simply agreed, at a planning session, that its reference had always been bigger than they thought. Every later estimate moved up with it.
What the Group Concluded
Before we broke, the group agreed on one diagnosis. The team's velocity rose mainly because its unit of measurement grew, not because it delivered more. The evidence was that the things velocity is supposed to lead to, more frequent releases and steady or better quality, did not change. A team that truly did 70 percent more work would release more often or ship more features per release. This team shipped at the same pace with bigger numbers attached. Rubin (2012) warns that velocity is a planning tool for a team's own use and becomes unreliable once it is used to compare or judge teams, because the people producing it can change it without changing anything else.
The team did not get faster; its ruler got shorter.
I want to be fair to the portal team. Nobody in the case acted dishonestly. Re-scoring a reference story can be a reasonable correction. But once velocity sat on an executive dashboard, every small upward adjustment was rewarded, and nothing pushed back.
What Changed in My View
I had treated velocity as a measure of output, like units produced on a line. After the session I see it as nearer to a private calibration: useful to the team that sets it for deciding how much to take on, and unreliable once anyone outside the team treats it as a score. My mistake was not a calculation error; I had trusted a number without asking what had happened to the scale.
Back at Larkspur
Two weeks before the seminar, our vice president of operations asked our development manager to add the app team's velocity to the monthly operations report, beside the call center's average handle time and the maintenance team's completion rates. I had thought it was a harmless request. Now I see where it leads. I raised it with our Scrum Master the next morning and suggested that the report instead show measures that residents feel: how many app releases shipped, how long a resident's repair request takes from report to completion, and defects reported by residents. Those are harder to inflate because the team does not set their scale, and they match the Scrum Guide's idea that progress is judged by the Increment delivered, not by the effort spent (Schwaber & Sutherland, 2020). He agreed to bring the alternative to the vice president, and I offered to draft the first version of the report myself.
References
Goodhart, C. A. E. (1984). Monetary theory and practice: The UK experience. Macmillan.
Rubin, K. S. (2012). Essential Scrum: A practical guide to the most popular agile process. Addison-Wesley.
Schwaber, K., & Sutherland, J. (2020). The Scrum guide. https://scrumguides.org/scrum-guide.html
The Purdue Global MT247 Unit 6 instructions
In Unit 6 the class takes one agile measurement case apart together, and the written piece traces your view from arrival to the end of the hour and then into your own work. Record the specific points classmates raised, by first name, and the evidence behind them. Expect to use an idea such as Goodhart's law or the limits of velocity, first on the case and afterward on a team you know. Be fair to the team in the case and avoid accusing anyone of dishonesty without evidence. Proposing alternative measures is often expected when the case is about metrics. First person is fine; the sources still need APA 7 entries, and three pages is about right.
How this MT247 Unit 6 example is built
The reflection opens with the case as presented, velocity rising through six Sprints after the dashboard while defects and releases stayed flat. The writer's first reading, that the team had matured, is set down with her own team's history as support. The discussion section records Tomas naming Goodhart's law and Priya finding the re-scored reference story, under a margin note on the evidence that broke the first reading. The group's diagnosis follows with Rubin on velocity, the highlighted line about a shorter ruler and a paragraph that is fair to the portal team. A section on what changed treats velocity as a private calibration, marked by a second note, and the close proposes three resident-facing measures for Larkspur.
Reading the MT247 Unit 6 grading rubric
Credit in an MT 247 reflection goes to an honest starting view, specific evidence from the discussion, correct use of a measurement concept and a practical application. Naming who raised what, and the detail that mattered, earns more than a summary of the hour. Applying Goodhart's law or the Guide's view of progress accurately to the case shows understanding. Graders reward fairness to the team studied and caution about motive. A closing application to the writer's own workplace, with concrete alternative measures, shows the lesson carried over. First person is expected, and the case figures and sources need to be reported accurately.
Common MT247 Unit 6 mistakes, and how to avoid them
Students often write that the team in the case was gaming its numbers without evidence, which turns analysis into accusation. Another common gap is recording what classmates said without saying how it changed the writer's view. Some reflections define Goodhart's law and never apply it. Others criticize velocity reporting without proposing anything better. Keep the case's figures exactly as presented, and give classmates first names only. A reflection that ends with a change in your own workplace reads stronger than one that ends with the case. Tell us the case your seminar discussed and what you thought going in, and a writer can draft the reflection around the point that changed your view.
Get an MT247 Unit 6 example written to your instructions
Which struggling team did the session examine, what was your first reading, and when did it shift? Answers to those three questions, or notes on the written alternative, are enough, alongside the Unit 6 prompt and rubric. The first reflection is free and ready inside 24-48h, classmates reduced to their fields. The paper above is an original model document written by our desk, not a submitted student paper and not an official Purdue University Global document.
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MT247 Unit 6 questions, answered
What if the seminar never reached agreement?
Then the reflection reports the disagreement and where the writer landed within it. Sessions that end with two competing diagnoses still give a writer material, provided the reflection explains which evidence each side relied on and why one persuaded more. Claiming a consensus that did not exist is the weaker choice, since classmates and the instructor were there too.
Is it fair to call a team's velocity inflated?
It is fair when evidence supports it and the reflection treats it as a system effect rather than dishonesty. In the example, flat defect counts and a re-scored reference story made the case, and the group concluded the team responded predictably to being measured. Describing the pressure rather than blaming the people keeps the analysis fair and closer to what rubrics reward.
Do I need to propose alternative measures?
Many prompts ask what the writer will do differently, and a specific proposal answers that better than a resolve. The example suggests two measures for a vice president's report and explains why each is harder to inflate. If your prompt asks only for reflection on the discussion, the application can be shorter, but a concrete next step usually strengthens the piece.
Where can I find a free MT247 Unit 6 sample paper?
The full MT247 Unit 6 seminar reflection is here. It follows a tester who believed a hospital team's rising velocity meant improvement until classmates raised Goodhart's law and a re-scored reference story.
What measures does the MT247 Unit 6 sample propose instead of velocity?
App releases shipped, the time a resident's repair request takes from report to completion, and defects reported by residents, all measures the team cannot inflate by changing its own scale.