Moving the Finish Line

Question: How do you demotivate a Scrum team?\n\nAnswer: Move the finish line.\n\n\n\nLet me paint you a picture…  imagine you are in a race.  The 100 yard dash.  You’ve been training, practicing the starting blocks and getting ready for the big race.\n\nYou are in the blocks, ready to explode and start running at the sound of the gun.\n\nThe gun fires “BANG”.\n\nYou take off down the track.\n\n90 yards\n\n70 yards\n\n40 yards\n\n30 yards, you can see the finish line clearly now… almost there\n\n20 yards, just keep sprinting and you will be there!\n\n50 yards, wtf?  Did the finish line just move?\n\n60 yards, eh?  Did it just move again?!\n\nDo you keep running hard at this point, or do you start walking?  If you are like most people, you will start walking.  If you are like most Scrum teams, you will start walking.\n\nNow, imagine if this happens every sprint.  Pretty soon training becomes less important.  You find yourself not even using the blocks because it is not going to matter.  After a few iterations of this the team is walking from the get-go, not even running at all.\n\nDo not move the finish line.  Don’t do it.