A brilliant way how to clarify the Scrum Master Responsibilities List

A BRILLIANT WAY TO CLARIFY THE SCRUM MASTER RESPONSIBILITIES LIST

Hi guys, in this blog post I want to explain a way to help teams understand the Scrum Master responsibilities List. This post will be very straightforward and short, but sometimes the simplest things are the best ;).

I have observed something interesting when working with teams. It´s not unusual to see people complaining about the Scrum Master Responsibilities list. They do not complain about the responsibilities of a Scrum Master; they complain because their expectations are not aligned with the ones the Scrum Master should have.

I have written about the Scrum Master Responsibilities a lot. Below you can find several blog posts that I wrote during the last weeks:

• Scrum Master Role
• Scrum Master job description
• Scrum Master as Servant Leader

One of the teams I work with had a situation that almost got out of the control. The environment got quite dark, and the relationship between people was not the best. To solve this kind of situation I thought in doing a 2 hours “get-together” session to clarify roles.

The session was quite simple, and the outcome was fantastic. So what did I do in that session?

I asked them to read the blog posts I share above.

I asked the Product Owner and teams to prepare a list of expectations of a Scrum Master Responsibilities.

And I asked the Scrum Master to make a list of what he thinks his role is.
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s an Agile Coach, I developed a list of expectations of what the organisation expects from the Scrum Master.

During the session, I asked one by one to present their expectation on the flip charts. They had enough time to explain what their expectations were and why they were important. I ended this part showing what the organisation expects from the Scrum Master.

Having all the expectations on a flip chart, I asked them to create a final flipchart with the roles and responsibilities. This gave them the opportunity to create a Scrum Master Responsibilities for the team.

Honestly, the final list was not any different from what I presented in my blog posts. I could have sent the blogs and only ask for a definitive list. I am kidding 😉 Of course I could not. What made the difference was the opportunity for everyone to speak up and to listen.

Giving the opportunity for people to share what they think and feel it´s incredibly powerful. It creates an understanding and eagerness to cooperate. This is exactly what we achieved with this sessions.

The outcome was not much different from the original blogs, but the team spirit increased and improved quite a lot. I believe this course caused some positive effect.

Nowadays, we have the final list in our room to remind everyone what the Scrum Master Responsibilities are.

As I mentioned, this was a very short blog post, but I still believe it will help some people out there.

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