"Scrum Master" is one of the most common job titles in agile teams, and also one of the most misunderstood. Some organizations treat it as a meeting organizer, others as a renamed project manager. The clearest way to understand the role is to go back to the source: the Scrum Guide, written by Scrum's co-creators Ken Schwaber and Jeff Sutherland. Its current version was published in November 2020.
Where the Scrum Master fits
The Scrum Guide describes a Scrum Team as one Scrum Master, one Product Owner, and Developers, typically 10 or fewer people. The 2020 edition calls these three "accountabilities" rather than "roles":
- Developers create a usable Increment every Sprint.
- The Product Owner is accountable for maximizing the value of the product and for managing the Product Backlog.
- The Scrum Master is accountable for establishing Scrum as defined in the Scrum Guide.
What the Scrum Master is accountable for
According to the Scrum Guide, the Scrum Master helps everyone understand Scrum theory and practice, both within the Scrum Team and across the organization. The Scrum Master is also accountable for the Scrum Team's effectiveness, by enabling the team to improve its practices within the Scrum framework.
The guide describes Scrum Masters as "true leaders who serve the Scrum Team and the larger organization." In practice, this means the role leads through coaching, facilitation and removing obstacles rather than through giving orders.
How a Scrum Master serves the team
The Scrum Guide lists the ways a Scrum Master serves the Scrum Team:
- Coaching team members in self-management and cross-functionality.
- Helping the team focus on creating high-value Increments that meet the Definition of Done.
- Causing the removal of impediments to the team's progress.
- Ensuring that all Scrum events take place and are positive, productive, and kept within their timeboxes.
How a Scrum Master serves the Product Owner
- Helping find techniques for effective Product Goal definition and Product Backlog management.
- Helping the Scrum Team understand the need for clear and concise Product Backlog items.
- Helping establish empirical product planning for a complex environment.
- Facilitating stakeholder collaboration as requested or needed.
How a Scrum Master serves the organization
- Leading, training, and coaching the organization in its Scrum adoption.
- Planning and advising Scrum implementations within the organization.
- Helping employees and stakeholders understand and enact an empirical approach for complex work.
- Removing barriers between stakeholders and Scrum Teams.
The events a Scrum Master helps keep effective
Scrum has five events, and the Scrum Guide sets a maximum length (a "timebox") for each:
- The Sprint: a fixed length of one month or less. It contains all the other events.
- Sprint Planning: a maximum of eight hours for a one-month Sprint.
- Daily Scrum: 15 minutes, every day of the Sprint.
- Sprint Review: a maximum of four hours for a one-month Sprint.
- Sprint Retrospective: a maximum of three hours for a one-month Sprint.
For shorter Sprints, these events are usually shorter. The Scrum Master doesn't have to run every event personally, but is accountable for making sure they happen and stay useful.
What a Scrum Master is not
Reading the Scrum Guide closely also shows what the role does not include:
- Not the person who decides what to build. Ordering the Product Backlog is the Product Owner's accountability.
- Not the person who assigns work. The Sprint Backlog is described as a plan by and for the Developers, and the team is self-managing.
- Not just a meeting scheduler. The guide makes the Scrum Master accountable for the team's effectiveness and for helping the whole organization adopt Scrum, which goes well beyond calendar management.
Scrum Masters in hybrid organizations
Many organizations don't run every project with Scrum. The Project Management Institute (PMI) reports that the use of hybrid approaches, which combine agile and predictive (plan-driven) methods, grew from 20% of projects in 2020 to 31.5% in 2023.
In these environments, the Scrum Master's work can extend to the boundaries between teams: helping a Scrum team connect with stage-gate approvals, fixed-date commitments or teams that work in a predictive way, without losing the empirical, iterative core of Scrum.
Sources
- Ken Schwaber and Jeff Sutherland, The Scrum Guide (November 2020)
- Project Management Institute, Hybrid Project Management: project management embraces the fit-for-purpose approach
- Project Management Institute, Pulse of the Profession 2024: The Future of Project Work
