Question

During a sprint, your development team reports they cannot progress on three high-priority stories because a required API from an external partner organization has not been delivered. The partner is outside your organization's reporting structure and has repeatedly missed informal commitments. The team is becoming frustrated and idle. What is the BEST action for the project manager to take?

Accepted Answer

Escalate to the appropriate sponsor or governance body to formally engage the partner and secure a committed delivery date for the dependency

Answer

Instruct the team to build a temporary mock of the API so they can continue, and remove the blocked stories from the sprint without further discussion

Answer

Wait until the next partner status meeting to raise the issue, since the dependency is outside your direct control

Answer

Reassign the idle developers to a different project until the partner delivers the API