Related guides
Guide
The Scrum Master's startup guide
What you need to know to get up and running as a Scrum Master
About this guide
If you are starting out as a Scrum Master, or face some of the Scrum Master's responsibilities, this guide gives you a basic understanding of your work and how to get going. Most Scrum Masters assume this role in addition to their normal "day job". This guide is perfect for them.
In many cases, Scrum Master can also be a full time role. But in those cases, full-time the Scrum Master often takes care of several scrum teams.
Much more often, Scrum Master is a role that someone in the development team takes on in addition to their normal duties. As a part-time Scrum Master, you will probably dedicate only 5-10% of your time to your Scrum Master duties (this does not include participation in the team ceremonies, which all team members naturally participate in).
Who exactly is the guide for?
If you are just starting to work as a Scrum Master, part-time while you continue your other duties: this guide is especially for you.
But it is also a great resource for teams who decide to rotate the scrum mastership between from team members.
No need to rush in to book a seat on a "Certified Scrum Master" two-day course. You can get up to speed and be an effective Scrum Master in just a couple of hours. So let's get to it!
Receive this guide as a PDF by e-mail
1. Why you need to do Agile well
With effective Agile methods and scrum, your team performs better and will experience less stress. The team will improve and work in a more sustainable way, for longer periods of time, without the need for overtime.
You will benefit in the following ways:
See better, how the work is progressing
Adapt better to unexpected changes in your environment
Deliver business value faster
Significantly lower your risk
Additionally, your key stakeholders are more happier because:
Customers are more satisfied
Management are more satisfied
Employee are more satisfied and team spirit is higher
2. The manifesto and principles that Agile is based on, in short
Agile manifesto
Agile principles
Our highest priority is to satisfy the customer through early and continuous delivery of valuable software.
Welcome changing requirements, even late in development. Agile processes harness change for the customer's competitive advantage.
Deliver working software frequently, from a couple of weeks to a couple of months, with a preference to the shorter timescale.
Business people and developers must work together daily throughout the project.
Build projects around motivated individuals. Give them the environment and support they need, and trust them to get the job done.
The most efficient and effective method of conveying information to and within a development team is face-to-face conversation.
Working software is the primary measure of progress.
Agile processes promote sustainable development. The sponsors, developers, and users should be able to maintain a constant pace indefinitely.
Continuous attention to technical excellence and good design enhances agility.
Simplicity – the art of maximizing the amount of work not done – is essential.
The best architectures, requirements, and designs emerge from self-organizing teams.
At regular intervals, the team reflects on how to become more effective, then tunes and adjusts its behavior accordingly.
The Scrum values
Scrum is based on the three principles of Transparency, Inspection, and Adaptation.
Transparency:
this means for example, that no work, specification, problems, risks or progress of work is hidden. Everyone on the team and outside must have access and visibility of how the work is proceeding.
Inspection:
this means that the team is motivated and willing to look at the results of the work, and the process that created it – and then analyze the result and compare it to what the team wants to achieve.
Adaptation:
this means that the team actively seeks to adjust course based on what it feels is the correct direction to take.
Respect
All team members contribute to the target. Collaboration and other's ideas are respected. Other people's accomplishments are celebrated.
Openness
Team members are honest when they need help. An open-minded team always seeks to improve and learn. Ceremonies like daily and review show clearly and openly how things went. Assumptions are voiced out loud.
Commitment
The team is protected from sprint scope changes, and the sprint planning session seeks opinions from the team to deliver. In the daily - the team feels pressure to deliver promise.
Focus
The team finishes what they start and does not get sidetracked.
Courage
Question the status quo, feel safe to ask for help and say no. The team does not fear difficult conversations.
4. The ceremonies in Agile
Agile ceremonies are meetings that happen regularly on a weekly, daily or per sprint frequency. The content and format of the meeting varies very little. The ceremonies are an integral part of the Agile way of working. Ceremony facilitation and improvement usually is the responsibility of the Scrum Master.
Scrum uses all the below ceremonies. Kanban uses four of them, but lacks sprint planning and review because Kanban does not have sprints. Kanban teams must have another frequency to discuss items that fall into sprint planning and review agenda.
Agile Ceremonies Overview
Backlog refinement
Regular meeting to improve the top of the backlog, and maintain the rest of it.
Sprint planning
At the start of sprint, the team and product owner get together to plan and commit what can be done in the coming sprint.
Daily
A short, daily meeting where the team self-organizes what has been completed, what is started next, and keeps work going forward.
Retrospective
Regular meeting that reflects on past work, and finds better ways to do things.
Sprint review
At the completion of the sprint, the team and PO get together to review done and not done items, and also reflect on learnings and the big picture.
Demo
The team presents complete work to stakeholders to get feedback.
Backlog refinement
Regular backlog refinement is key in a process that delivers high quality work. Backlog refinement relies on "Definition of Ready" – the team's agreement on what kind of work it agrees to start.
Sprint planning
The sprint planning is where the team finalizes any backlog items that it agrees to be part of the sprint scope. Sprint planning starts from a ProductOwner's proposal or prioritized backlog. Definition of Done must exist for the team to be able to commit to any sprint scope. The team must measure velocity (the amount of completed work in each sprint) and use this velocity to guide how much work to load into each new sprint.
Daily
The daily is the only meeting during the sprint that aims to ensure that the team achieves the sprint goals. That is why it is so important. The team must be made to feel that it is checking Done, In Progress and Still to be Done in the sprint backlog. If there are any problems, risks or blockers, these should be raised, so the team can react in an Agile manner to any setbacks.
The daily is also a planned interruption. Things that are urgent, should not wait for the daily. But other things, that are not urgent, can wait. This way, other interruptions can be minimized.
Retrospective
The retrospective lets the team analyze, explore and improve their ways of working. The team considers what worked well, and what did not. There are thousands of methods to use to guide the retrospective discussion The key things are that the team agrees concrete action points to take in the next sprint. The team should focus most of their energy and time on the things under their control.
Sprint review
A sprint review is where the team checks the result of the sprint – which backlog items were done and which were not. This is also a place for reflection – do the completed items fulfill the needs of the user/customer? Did you find some new issues which need to be on the backlog?
Demo
The demo is used to show what was Done in the last sprint. The target audience is stakeholders that are interested in the work items. The demo session can be adjacent to the sprint review meeting, or it can also be at a different time if more stakeholders can participate in it. The key thing is to get comments and feedback.
6. The new Scrum Master checklist
The most important things to do as new Scrum Master are:
1
Get to know your team and stakeholders
2
Set up the ceremonies and ensure they happen
3
Workshop Definition of Ready and Definition of Done
4
Ensure the team has a scrum board
5
Start measuring velocity
6
Facilitate continuous improvement
Recommended further reading
Scrum Field Guide
The Happiness Advantage
Refactoring
Finish
Agile Retrospectives
The Phoenix Project
The Unicorn project
