SCRUMpelstiltskin

Once upon a time there was a miller who was poor but had a beautiful daughter. When he came to speak to the king one day, he acted importantly and said to him: "Dear Kingdom Owner, I have a clever daughter who is good at what she does. Not only is she quick and delivers early and regularly, she also constantly strives to improve her working methods. You won't believe it, she can now spin straw into gold".

He replied, "That's a work product that I really like! If your daughter is as skillful as you say, she can join me in my castle tomorrow, I want to see that! If it works out to my satisfaction and she can really deliver gold, she'll be my perfect addition as Kingdom Owner!"

With the help of her father, the miller's daughter was brought before the king, who immediately led her into an ideal project environment, a chamber full of straw. He gave her all the necessary tools, such as a wheel and reel, and said: "Your father said you could deliver early... Your sprint will take one night. If you haven't spun this straw into gold by tomorrow morning, you will die! I don't want an increment, I want a real shippable product!" Then the chamber was locked and she remained alone in it.

There sat the poor miller's daughter, doubting the Kingdom Owner's leadership qualities, left alone with a negatively worded and unmotivating user story and anxious because her father had lied to the Kingdom Owner, as she knew nothing about spinning straw into gold. Her fear grew so great that she finally started to cry. Suddenly the door opened and a little man came in and said: "Good evening, Maid Miller, why are you crying so much?" "Oh," replied the girl, "I'm supposed to spin straw into gold and I don't know anything about it." Then the little man said: "What will you give me if we do some pair spinning and support you?" "My necklace," said the girl. The little man took the collar, sat down in front of the wheel with the miller's daughter, and purr, purr, purr, three times the spool was full. And so it went on until morning, when all the straw was spun and all the bobbins were full of gold.

When the king came to the review in the morning and was presented with all the gold, he was amazed and delighted, but his heart only grew more eager, and he had the girl taken to another project environment full of straw, which was even bigger, and again only gave her one night's sprint to spin if she would love life - he was obviously not familiar with positive leadership. The girl didn't know what to do and cried, then the door opened again and the little man came and said: "What will you give me if I support you in the product development process again?" "My ring," the girl replied. The little man took the ring and by morning all the straw had been spun into shiny gold. The king was overjoyed at the sight of the new review, but was still not satisfied with the gold and had the miller's daughter brought to an even larger store floor full of straw and said: "You must spin this in the coming night sprint; if you succeed, you shall become my co-kingdom owner" - did he seem to be concerned with employee motivation, the beautiful miller's daughter wondered?

When she was alone, the little man came again for the third time and said: "What will you give me if I help you again with the early and regular deliveries?" "I have nothing more to give," the girl replied. "So promise me, when you become Kingdom Owner, your first child." The miller's daughter did not know how else to organize herself in the emergency and promised the male what he asked for; in return, the male assisted once again in delivering the desired increment. In the morning, the Kingdom Owner praised the miller's steadily improving performance in the sprint retrospective. So he married her and the beautiful miller's daughter became a queen.

After a year, she gave birth to a beautiful child and thought no more of the male, when he entered her chamber and said, "Now give me what you promised". The queen was frightened and offered the male all the riches of the kingdom if he would let her have the child, but the male said, "No, I would rather have something alive than all the treasures in the world". The queen began to moan and cry so much that the male took pity on her. They agreed together as the definitive user story for a three-day sprint "find out my name (-> product owner/male) by the end of the sprint - so you (-> team member/queen) can keep your child."

Now the queen spent the whole night thinking of all the names she had ever heard and sent a messenger across the country to inquire far and wide for new names. When the male product owner arrived the next day, she asked him clarifying questions such as "Is your name Malte?" or "Is your name Lutz?" and many other questions about all the names she knew, one after the other, but each time the little man said: "That's not my name." On the second day, together with her team of subordinates, she asked all the people and told the little man the most unusual and strange ones, "Rippenbiest", "Lothar", "Schnürbein" or "Timo", but he stuck to his guns: "That's not my name." On the third day, a messenger who had been sent out returned and said: "I couldn't find a single new name, but when I came to a high castle around the corner of the forest, where fox and hare say goodnight to each other, I saw a small house there, and a fire was burning in front of the house, and a ridiculous little man was jumping around the fire, hopping on one leg and shouting:

"Today I'll finish the user story "Baking", tomorrow the one for "Brewing",
the day after tomorrow after the sprint review I'll get the queen her child;
oh, how good it is that nobody knows
that my name is SCRUMpelstiltskin!"

Then the queen was glad that she knew the name, and now at the end of the sprint the little man came to the review and said, "Well, Madam Queen, what is my name?" she asked first, "Is your name Oliver?" "No." "Is your name Frank?" "No." "Is your name SCRUMpelstiltskin?"

Then SCRUMpelstiltskin screamed loudly and pushed his right foot deep into the ground in anger and in his rage grabbed his left foot with both hands and tore himself in half.

And the moral of the story - SCRUM doesn't help choleric dwarves!