The role, the mystery — Scrum master
Scrum masters are monkeys, and you only need developers. You don’t need Scrum masters for transformation, and so goes various conversations on LinkedIn. I am aware many people share similar sentiments.
In broad strokes, the confusion around the role and the unfortunate perception of the Scrum master’s role as a handyman — the team’s secretary and an impediment remover is behind this.
Today, the Scrum master is considered a passive and tactless role, who, if not kept busy, will start asking irritating, open-ended questions.
Scrum has always been about small cross-functional teams accountable for creating a valuable and useful increment every sprint and for achieving it
- The product owner takes accountability for maximizing the ROI,
- Developers take accountability for creating a usable increment each sprint, and
- The scrum master takes accountability for the Scrum team’s effectiveness.
To say the Scrum master is accountable for the team’s effectiveness is in no way referring to the developers or the product owner as ignorant or incapable. In Scrum, every role has a place, focus, corresponding expertise, and (complementary) skillsets needed to succeed. No one skill is considered superior or replaceable.
The Scrum master focuses on helping every organization member understand Scrum theory and practices for which the apparent foundational qualification is a deep understanding of Scrum.
That is not to say that knowledge of Scrum is the only competence to be a skillful Scrum master and a successful change agent.
A Scrum master needs to master effective ways of transmitting knowledge in a manner relevant to the situation.
The Scrum master may operate with a focus on enabling (trainer or a mentor) or empowering (facilitator or a coach) the folks they serve.
Identifying the correct stances and the ability to move between them quickly is an equally important skill needed in a Scrum master.
The stances of the Scrum master should not be construed as approaches for enforcing the Scrum guide but rather as bearings needed for a team to start with Scrum and to continuously evolve an approach that’s best suited for the team at that point in time.
The Scrum master’s priority should be to build hyper-performing Scrum teams by focusing on collaboration, autonomy, and self-management.
Scrum masters have a low tolerance for organizational impediments and aggressively remove them.
The Scrum masters bring a behavioral shift in management — from predictive to empirical management.
The Scrum masters are true leaders who serve the teams and the organization to design a way of working that helps realize the transformation results as reflected in the business outcomes.
In a nutshell, the Scrum masters spend time and energy in building hyper-performing teams capable of using Scrum for
- Reliable and quality delivery of valuable and useful increments
- Self-managing teams focused on relentless improvement
