A firmware team at a consumer home-robot company is three days into a two-week Sprint when a supplier reports a PCB revision won't arrive until after the Sprint's original end date. The Scrum Master is asked to extend the current Sprint by a week to accommodate the delay instead of ending it on schedule. According to the Scrum Guide, what should happen to the Sprint's length?
Select an answer to reveal the explanation.
Short Explanation
Think of a Sprint like a train leaving on a fixed schedule — a supplier hiccup doesn't push the departure time back. Once a Sprint's length is set, it keeps that same length for the rest of that Sprint, and a timebox doesn't flex just because the news is bad. Extending it would only hide the risk instead of forcing the team to inspect and adapt around it.
Full Explanation
The Scrum Guide fixes the Sprint's duration once it starts: a Sprint's length cannot be shortened or lengthened while it is underway. This matters because Sprints are the container inside which every other Scrum event happens, and a consistent, unchanging length is what lets the Scrum Team, the Product Owner, and stakeholders compare progress from one Sprint to the next and inspect whether the plan is working. A hardware delay is real information, but it belongs in the Sprint Backlog conversation - the Developers re-plan what is achievable inside the remaining days, or the Product Owner reconsiders scope - not in a renegotiation of the calendar. Extending the Sprint treats a supplier problem as a reason to bend a structural rule rather than adapt the plan. A one-time Product Owner-approved extension invents an exception the Guide does not grant to any accountability. A quarterly extension allowance invents a policy that appears nowhere in the Guide. The caveat: a Sprint can only end early through cancellation by the Product Owner, and that is a distinct event from lengthening one. A quick operational check: if a Scrum Master hears "let's just push the end date," the answer is to protect the timebox and instead surface the blocked item for re-planning or removal.