Are Scrum Masters Enlightened?
Reflections after 3 years of practicing Scrum Master
Once upon a time, a developer with six years of experience became a Scrum Master. He invited a small group of friends over to a small dinner party. His friends congratulated him on the new job. They celebrated, they ate, but they had no clue about what he did.
After dinner, one friend came up to him and said, “What do you do again?”.
The Scrum Master replied, “Well, I am a Scrum Master now”.
The friend kept silent for a moment. No muscle on her face moved.
Another moment of awkward silence passed, and then the Scrum Master added, “Uhm. I do management work… for a software company… a manager, in a software company…”.
“Oh nice for you!”, interrupted the friend.
“And, how are your colleagues like? Who is your Boss? I hope you are getting treated nicely…”.
The conversation ended soon after and the friend left the party thinking to herself:
“Some Master! What a geeky title! He must be seeking enlightenment himself! It kinda suits his personality in a way…”.
She laughed to herself, took the elevator, and went home.
Three years after, our Scrum master was out with his friends. They were driving around the city, and the sun was about to go down.
Down the road stood a beautiful tree with no leaves. Next to the tree, stood a broken wall, above that, pillows of clouds filled the sky like crowd in a stadium. Our no-longer-fresh Scrum Master stopped, grabbed his phone and took a picture of the scene.
The scenery was breathtaking, time paused for a moment, and a writing on the wall appeared: “Be Present”.
It was the work of our Scrum Master’s imagination, he has fallen into a deep state of contentment.
Reflections from the Scrum Master
After three years of practicing a Scrum Master role, the most important qualities I have learned were: Listening, Seeing and Humility. I have learned these qualities by practicing “being present”.
The pracrice of being present comes form lots of research around ‘Enlightenment’. It is similar to mindfulness, awareness and meditation, which are other trending terms or practices in the modern world.
In this article however, we focused on being present. In the authors opinion, it is the most important practice a Scrum Master should master.
“Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment.” — Gautama Buddha
№1 “Listening” uncovers underlying issues
I can’t forget that time when, I heard John refusing to take a new task in Sprint Planning. That was odd because John used to be our first inline to take new Stories.
I talked to John afterwards and listened. John spent a lot of time last sprints helping a lazy team member. He had to cover up for them three times now, and that stressed him out. it left John feeling alone and deserted.
John felt heard afterwards, and got back to being active in the team. What I learned was: listening to John helped me uncover the underlying issue. And locating the underlying issue opened new doors to fixing it.
№2 “Seeing” opens perspective to notice connected issues
I still remember that time when, I looked at Joe as he refused to submit a proper fix to a blocker issue. The proper fix was straight forward. Yet, Joe continued to do temporary fixes for anyone complaining about the issue.
A week later, 7 people got blocked by that issue (even for only one hour each). Joe helped, but still sent a temporary fix. I looked at Joe every time he did that and wondered why he did it? why didn’t John submit the proper fix?
Days after, I was chatting with Joe’s colleagues and found out the reason behind. Joe was mad at a recent process change we implemented. He wanted to show how that change is bad, and it creates blockers.
Seeing the reason behind made me realize why Joe submitted temporary fixes. And realizing that made me explore new ways to fix the process. That helped contain this and future situations.
№3 “Staying humble” keeps the focus where it needs to be
I always remind myself that supporting hard working colleagues is important. I remember this one time when I stayed late on a Friday night to help Ben with a complex task. We stayed till 11:00 pm until Ben delivered a fix.
The team never knew we were together, and all the credit went to Ben for fixing that issue. The Support team thanked Ben’s timely response and Ben continued to work hard since then.
By staying humble I kept the focus where it needed to be. The support team appreciated the developer, there was no Scrum Master in the scene.
Reflections: the gist
Our Scrum Master ended his imagination and snapped back to reality. The scene had passed and three reflections remained:
- Hear what the team members have to say, but listen to what made them say it.
- Look at how the team members resist your advice, but see what events around them pushed them to do it.
- Help a team member fix an issue, but stay humble enough to give them full credit for solving it. Keep the focus on the team, not the Scrum Master.
