TOP 3 CHALLENGES A SCRUM MASTER USUALLY FACES
A Scrum Master (SM) is basically a servant-leader, whose primary job is to ensure whether his/her team follows the right thing or not to achieve the objectives of the Project. If you are new to this role, then you should know below challenges you will face at some point in your journey as SM.
Understanding of SCRUM: Sometimes you will be in a tricky situation; wherein you are ended up with team members who don’t know even what is a retrospective. Remember, even if one person like this can impact the entire team and project schedule. Sometimes, this can happen for even senior members of your team, who are used to the Waterfall model of delivery.
Though they understand SCRUM, they find it difficult to follow them, leading to conflicts within the team and even with SMs. As SM, it is a very important duty of yours to educate the team about the benefits of SCRUM. You should make sure that you know each person in your team well and their strengths and weaknesses. If someone really needs training arrange for it or you can conduct the same so that you can be sure about the team understands concepts well. As SM, you should make sure the team cultivates the collective ownership of their deliverables. Remember that you can only facilitate and guide them. The team should own their stuff to deliver it.
Delays in Problem Resolution & Schedule: What should an SM do in such situations? Is it his/her job?
According to Scrum principles outlined in the Scrum Guide, the role of the Scrum Master does not entail direct responsibility or decision-making authority concerning aspects such as scope, schedule, budget, or quality. Instead, the SM functions primarily as a coach, trainer, facilitator, and enabler. It’s crucial to understand that the SM is not a project manager in the traditional sense.
Hence, before diving into any actions, the SM should first ask themselves a fundamental question: Can the Product Owner (PO), the BA and the Team handle this issue independently? Ultimately, the aim is to empower the PO and the Team to effectively address all project-related challenges. They bear the responsibility for these issues, and consequently, they should take the lead in resolving them.
If it appears that the PO and the Team are capable of resolving the issue on their own, then the SM should refrain from intervening unnecessarily. Instead, they should continue observing, and if assistance is requested, they can offer their support. It’s important to adopt a coaching mindset, nurturing the team’s ability to handle challenges independently. By aiding the team in honing their skills and strategies through practice, they can confidently tackle any obstacles that arise during their work.
If you observe that the team is unable to resolve the issue, then comes one of the toughest challenges for an SM. For a new SM, this could be a major issue because, if something goes wrong, automatically you’ll also have to take ownership of the failure. Now, you are in a dilemma whether to help the team or not. Because, in essence, such issues are not your responsibility. But if the team is expecting your contribution, you must decide whether intervention is really necessary or not.
Even in such situations, if the problem is not critical and failure is not catastrophic, you can certainly guide the team on how the issue can be resolved. If the project is in a critical situation, you may take the lead and focus on facilitating a retrospective session to help the Product Owner and the Team analyze what went wrong, why it happened, and how they can prevent similar issues in the future. This approach fosters a culture of learning and empowers the team to improve and excel in their work. It’s through these experiences that they truly learn to navigate their challenges effectively.
Unexpected Scope Changes: Same situation as above. Though SCRUM welcomes change, such requests during the Sprint are not recommended. However, the team gets pressure from customers to include them, sometimes. When the schedule is at risk, an SM should ensure that the team is doing the required re-prioritization quickly as needed with required trade-offs so that the schedule is intact. Again, you should see and asses what’s the level of assistance you can provide to your team as SM — always remember, the SM functions primarily as a coach, trainer, facilitator, and enabler. It’s crucial to understand that the SM is not a project manager in the traditional sense. In a nutshell, in my opinion, SM should also make sure that the team should not fail.
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Basic Tips to Be a Successful Scrum Master
An SM, whose job is to ensure the team adheres to the SCRUM processes, an exhibition of such a mindset from team members can be challenging. However, figuring out ways to improve things is the core job of an SM. The SM is responsible for making the team understand Scrum and ensuring the team adheres to SCRUM principles. The SM is also responsible for removing any impediments to help the team become more self-organized and empowered to deliver real value.
In SCRUM, it’s not just about delivery, it’s about value, the value you deliver as part of your project delivery.
So, as an SM how will you ensure that the team is with you?
Here are a few aspects you should make sure your team is following so that you can become a successful SM.
- Get the Basics right. As an SM, you need to ensure SCRUM ceremonies (4 SCRUM Ceremonies are — Daily Stand-up, Sprint Planning, Sprint Review, and Retrospective) are happening. It’s not just about making sure they are happening, making sure they are engaging and productive for the team members.
- If Daily stand-ups are not happening regularly, then SM should find out the reason — why the stand-ups are boring or unproductive. Is it because it is not time-boxed? How we can make it productive and helpful for everyone? As an SM, one can figure out a way to make the time-boxed 15-minute Daily stand-up a fun-filled activity to make it engaging.
- The team is sometimes not even interested in Sprint retrospectives. They think there is no value in it. The main purpose of the retrospective is to understand how the previous Sprint went and what one can learn from it and adopt the learnings in future Sprints. While the imposition of processes/rules or templates may help to an extent, the SM should strive to make the session engaging and productive.
- Breaking the patterns can be one such tactic — instead of speaking, team members can present their stuff in a simple 1-slider. Do not impose any format. Allow the team to be creative. That’s why, an SM is a coach, who figures out ways to get the best out of the team members. If a team member thinks that Retrospectives or Stand-ups are not productive, an SM must make an honest effort to understand why the team member thinks so, identify the problem, and resolve it.
- You are not the Manager: If you are acting like a manager, then that’s the biggest mistake. It’s all about understanding every team member.
Hence, your individual connection with each team member also becomes important. This gives an opportunity for the team members to connect and engage with you individually. They will also feel valued & thus bringing them to the mainstream and helping them contribute to the overall process improvement activities.
