What’s a Scrum Master’s role?

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Scrum is a software development methodology that emphasizes communication and collaboration. The Scrum Master acts as an intermediary to ensure effective communication and collaboration between the product owner and team members. The Scrum Master is responsible for the process, including rule enforcement and decision-making related to the productivity of the team. The Scrum Master also provides the product owner with regular updates on the team’s progress and helps with process maintenance tasks.

Scrum is a software development methodology that focuses on facilitating communication and collaboration between team members. Typically, a Scrum development team will have three main roles: the product owner, the Scrum Master, and the team members. It is the Scrum Master who acts as an intermediary, with the aim of ensuring effective communication and purposeful collaboration between the product owner and team members. Its function is twofold: to increase the efficiency of the product owner and to facilitate the productivity of the team. Therefore, Scrum Masters find themselves in a leadership position that is one of servitude rather than full authority, even though rule enforcement is central to the position.

Working within a demanding role, the Scrum Master will perform a variety of tasks to fulfill his mission. These can be high-level tasks such as determining and directing workflows and work schedules. These tasks can also be low-level, like adjusting the temperature in a room where the team is working to ensure comfort during long hours of development. He or she will also respond to and mitigate disasters, such as fixing a developer’s computer if it goes down or ensuring that all systems are secure during the development process. In general, anything – no matter how big or small – that affects the team’s productivity is the responsibility of the Scrum Master.

Authority in the position, however, derives from the fact that the Scrum Master is responsible for the process. While this person may not be able to make direct decisions regarding individual team members, he or she has the authority to make decisions related to the productivity of the team as a whole. For example, if the Scrum Master feels that a new work schedule needs to be implemented to achieve realistic development goals and meet achievable deadlines, he will determine this new schedule and distribute it to team members. Rule enforcement is also a critical function of the position, to ensure the team doesn’t get bogged down by ineffective distractions.

Relying on the Scrum Master, the product owner expects a wealth of information about the team’s progress to make decisions and direction when needed. This information may include regular updates on different aspects of the development process and the challenges encountered. In assisting the Product Owner, the Scrum Master will also help with keeping overdue records and other relevant process maintenance tasks to ensure efficiency. In addition, he or she will act as a buffer between the product owner and the team to ensure that the goals are realistic and within the capabilities of the team during any specified time period.




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