Scrum Master

The Scrum Guide – 2020

The Scrum Master is accountable for establishing Scrum as defined in the Scrum Guide. They do this by helping everyone understand Scrum theory and practice, both within the Scrum Team and the organization.

The Scrum Master is accountable for the Scrum Team’s effectiveness. They do this by enabling the Scrum Team to improve its practices, within the Scrum framework.

Scrum Masters are true leaders who serve the Scrum Team and the larger organization.

© 2020 Ken Schwaber and Jeff Sutherland

Commentary

While we may associate some of these actions with the Agile Coach, there is no role for the Agile Coach in Scrum. Scrum, as an Agile framework, operates with self-managing teams. Large organizations, however, prefer to maintain centralized standards and practices and improve the agility of the broader organization which may not fit into the mission of an individual Scrum Master. Nevertheless, even if an organization works with Agile Coaches, it is still the Scrum Master who can best implement the common standards in the environment of a particular team.

The “servant-leader” expression is not in the Scrum Guide anymore. However, practitioners still remember this, thus we should better clarify it.

• The Scrum Master is a servant leader in the sense of providing service to the product owner, to the Developers and to the organization. Later sections of the Guide detail these services. The Scrum Master is NOT the servant whose task is to organize the meetings and print the cards (although they can).
• The Scrum Master is a leader in the sense that the individual in the role is the most knowledgeable Agile expert of the Scrum team who can give advice, consulting-, mentoring-, and coaching services to the team and to the organization. But not the boss-leader who tells whether TDD is compulsory, and which developer should choose which task.
• Good leadership skills are essential. Remember, you are not a leader if nobody follows you.

Commentary

When we compare these services to the responsibilities of the Product Owner, we can conclude that the Scrum Master’s service is overarching support for the Product Owner to accomplish his/her work. Nevertheless, the responsibility stays with the Product Owner, therefore taking actions and making decisions is still at the discretion of the Product Owner.

Note the word “including”, the list is not complete, just mentions the gist. The Scrum Master should do whatever seems to be appropriate within or about the Scrum framework for the success of the product.

Scrum Master Service to the Scrum Team

The Scrum Master serves the Scrum Team in several ways, including:

• Coaching the team members in self-management and cross-functionality;
• Helping the Scrum Team focus on creating high-value Increments that meet the Definition of Done;
• Causing the removal of impediments to the Scrum Team’s progress; and,
• Ensuring that all Scrum events take place and are positive, productive, and kept within the timebox.

Commentary

Let’s go through the list:

Coaching the team members in self-management and cross-functionality

This service is vital for new teams, especially in cases when the Developers are inexperienced Scrum Team members, not co-located and their overall seniority is low. More mature, experienced teams may not require coaching in self-organization and cross-functionality at all.

The 2020 edition changed ‘self-organizing’ to self-management. Is there a difference? Certainly, there is. Self-management is a broader term and now it is applied to the entire Scrum Team.

Helping the Scrum Team focus on creating high-value Increments that meet the Definition of Done

When looking at this service, we should remember the main principles of agile. In an agile process, product goals are only specified from the business’s point of view. On the other hand, the Developers have more responsibility in designing the solution than in a traditional environment.

Causing the removal of impediments to the Scrum Team’s progress

This is very straightforward, whatever blockers a team have, the Scrum Master is responsible for facilitating its resolution.

Ensuring that all Scrum events take place and are positive, productive, and kept within the timebox.

As a bit of a surprise, it is not ultimately the Scrum Master’s task to organize and conduct events:

1. Daily scrum: The Scrum Master is not even required to be there;
2. Sprint review meeting: The Product Owner is in a better position to invite stakeholders, the Developers have more skills to showcase or demonstrate the increment;
3. Planning: This is an event for the Product Owner and for the Developers;
4. Backlog refinement (as much as it is an event): like above, if it is based on a meeting at all;
5. The only event where the Scrum Master’s presence and contribution seem to be vital is the Sprint Retrospective.

The transition from a non-agile environment to a Scrum-based delivery process needs a change of attitude from the people who are impacted. Team members must understand that they have more responsibility when they are part of a Scrum Team. Managers must accept that the era of micro-management, task allocation, and campaign-style problem-solving is over. The Product Owner must get accustomed to thinking in Sprints instead of ad-hoc tasks and decisions. A project-based organisation has to learn to live without tasks having ‘allocated resources’ and value the new opportunities given by agility.

Commentary

Note the word “including”, the list was not meant to be complete.

We should not forget that the Guide gives a generic description of Scrum. E.g. the needs of a large, mature agile organisation are different from the needs of a small, less agile one. The chances are high that not all listed activities will fit into a given Scrum Master’s work.

Let’s check the listed items:

Leading, training, and coaching the organization in its Scrum adoption

This task is obviously important when Scrum is new or not yet fully implemented throughout the organisation. Note, that this is a service, not a responsibility or a mission. The Scrum Master gives guidance to the people in the organization whenever it seems plausible. In a large company, there is likely no need for this service of the Scrum Master, there will be agile coaches, principal Scrum Masters, and other professionals involved in the process of adopting Scrum organization-wide.

Planning and advising Scrum implementations within the organization

When an organization the very first team creates a Scrum Team, it is obvious that they need a Scrum Master. Someone must guide and facilitate the implementation process. Further new teams should leverage the experience of existing teams. There is a high chance that existing teams have already incorporated into their framework all the essential tools and processes used at the organization and can offer the know-how of practices followed. While every team is unique, we can expect similarities between them within the same organization.

Helping employees and stakeholders understand and enact an empirical approach for complex work

Whenever new stakeholders appear around a Scrum Team, they may need this service. The Scrum Master should always be ready to give a brief on the applied practices to the new people involved, and if the new stakeholder is inexperienced in Scrum, it is essential to give guidance on how to interact with the team, what is the role of the product backlog, what are the events for, how to learn about the status of a ‘project’ (in Scrum we rather develop products than complete projects, however, this may not be easy to take in for a new stakeholder), etc.

Removing barriers between stakeholders and Scrum Teams.

This responsibility is probably the most difficult one. As long as the Scrum Master is working with a team, it is relatively easy to find the common denominator with the team members and build commonly accepted norms. However, the relationship with the stakeholders is less intense and not necessarily cordial. The stakeholders may not have experience with Scrum, what is more, they may have a negative experience with it. People outside the Scrum Team may not want to delve into the particular delivery method at all, all they want is the tangible product. The Scrum Master has a diplomatic mission, something very different from the world of software development.

Common Pitfalls in Understanding the Role

The source of the quoted statements are Scrum Master job advertisements, thus these are real and severe misconceptions.

“Facilitate the Daily Stand-up”	First of all, there is no stand-up in Scrum. While this word is popular in the Agile community, in Scrum we have Daily Scrum and no rule enforces it to hold it as a stand-up (it is not to say we must not call it a stand-up, however, looks a bit ignorant in a job ad). According to the Scrum Guide, the Scrum Master does not even need to be there. The Daily Scrum is an internal meeting of the Developers. Considering its highly simple agenda, no facilitation is necessary. What is more, facilitation works against self-management.
“Handle the Scrum Board and update the metrics”	The Scrum Board is not a Scrum artifact. However, when it embodies the Sprint Backlog, the Scrum Guide clearly makes the Developers responsible for managing it. Though, it is not forbidden for the Scrum Master to participate in this activity.
“Organize the Scrum ceremonies”	First of all, there are no ceremonies in Scrum. Once this word was popular in the Agile community but in Scrum we rather have events. It may or may not be the Scrum Master who organizes the events. For instance, the Daily Scrum is an event of the Developers and the Sprint Review is mostly managed by the Product Owner. It is a matter of discussion who should organize and facilitate Scrum events.
“Provide reliable estimations for the User Stories”	A user story is by no means a Scrum term. We have Product Backlog items. Estimating them is the Developers’ discretionary right since only they have the right skills and experience for that.
“Shield the team from the stakeholders”	This is the biggest mistake a Scrum Master would make. Customer collaboration is key to any agile process. We can credit the idea of channelling stakeholder requests to the Product Owner, and keeping managers away from the Daily Scrum, though.
“Ensure quality standards are met”	The Scrum Master has many opportunities to improve the quality of the product (mainly through advocating adequate practices) but no means to ensure quality standards are met. This is the Developers’ responsibility.
“Strong budgeting experience”	The budget goes for the product and not for the process. The Scrum Master is responsible for the process. When the responsibilities of a traditional project manager are distributed between the Scrum roles, the product and the budget should go to the same person. The Scrum Master in a real Scrum implementation has no means to control the budget.

The Scrum Master’s Secret Added Value

There is, however, a very important aspect of the role of the Scrum Master which job descriptions often mention but the Scrum Guide does not: motivating the team. Today, when practically every developer has experience with Scrum, the Scrum Master’s added value is not in the technicalities. An arrogant Scrum Master is a minus one for the team and brings negative value to the organisation. A demotivated, disconnected team is far worse than an unmanaged one. And yet, a disappointingly huge proportion of Scrum Masters push for authority, occasionally demonstrate arrogant behaviour towards the team members and find the role’s purpose in reporting to the managers and micro-managing the Developers.

There is a performance fallacy in assessing the added value of these ‘Scrum Masters’. Managers at the organisation may perceive their work as instrumental since they seemingly drive the delivery process and achieve some results with their teams. However, in practice, they have a negative impact on their team and on their organisation’s performance. Objectively their salary is a ‘loss multiplicator’, they not only cost the organisation but actively cause waste.

Key Takeaways

• The Scrum Master is accountable for the health of the Scrum framework.
• The Scrum Master is not required to organize and facilitate Scrum events. The Scrum Master can do this, nevertheless, this is not the point of the role.
• The Scrum Master provides services to the Developers, the Product Owner and the organization.
• The services imply the Scrum Master must have expertise in the areas where help, coaching, advising, and training are required.
• The Scrum Master is a true leader and needs true leadership skills.
• The Scrum Master is responsible for the Scrum Team’s positivity and productivity.

External Content: YouTube video of the ScrumMastered channel