Specify your sprint schedule

Sprints are useful for scheduling work and providing focus for your team. Teams that employ agile or scrum practices can assign backlog items or user stories to sprints and use the task board to monitor progress.

Define sprints and set dates

For each sprint defined for your team, a corresponding sprint backlog page becomes available.

1. If you're not yet a member of the team project, get added as a team member.

2. Configure iterations from your team projects home page.

   

   Most team projects are created with a set of predefined iterations. For example, scrum projects are configured with four releases and six sprints for Release 1.

   

   But what if you want more sprints, or different names, or even want to move the sprint?

3. To add another sprint, select New child. Name it what you want. Here, we call it Sprint 7.

   

   Tip

   To change the name or to relocate to another parent node, open the iteration and modify its properties.

4. Select the sprints your team will use. These sprints will show up on your Backlog page.

   

5. Open a sprint or iteration, and set the start and end dates.

   

   Tip

   After you set the start and end dates for one iteration, the calendar tool automatically attempts to set the next set of dates, based on the same iteration length you specified for the first. For example, if you set a 3 week sprint for Sprint 1, then when you select the start date for Sprint 2, the calendar tool automatically determines the start and end dates based on the next three weeks. You can accept or change these dates.

   Close the Iterations dialog box when you're finished.

6. Refresh your Home page to see updated charts.

With sprints defined, team members can assign work items to current or future iterations. They can work in sprints.

Related content

Sprint Planning by Mitch Lacey provides examples and strategies for keeping sprint planning focused and effective.