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An Ideal Career Path for a Scrum Master
An Ideal Scrum Master Career Path The Scrum Master role is increasingly becoming more and more in demand these days. This role is played by a variety of people. We may see someone in the development team playing this role, such as the technical lead, or a developer, or a QA person, or even an analyst. Alternatively, project managers play this role to support the scrum team. Many other people have dedicated their lives to playing this role as a servant leader scrum master. There are instances when this role is shared among different people in the team, and there are times when this role is rotated among the different members of the development team. Many times, because this is the role they were passionate about, some people who play scrum masters think about how to grow stronger and more knowledgeable as scrum masters or servant leaders. At other times, even while playing the role on a part time basis, an occasional developer may feel this is a role that they would like to pursue as a career option: servant leading and helping create greatness in their teams. Whoever that person is, if they want to grow strongly into this path of servant leadership, here are some tips that I can share from my experience. These tips can not only help you get hired as a Scrum Master but will also help you grow strong, and create a niche for yourself, impact a lot of people in your organization positively, and will also bring a lot of satisfaction and contentment into your own life. Ideal Qualities of Scrum Master First, never see this role as a means to quickly make money. What I mean here is, if you really want to grow as a scrum master, give the due diligence that this role asks for. Go deeply into understanding the values and principles of Agile, the Scrum Values of Commitment, Focus, Openness, Respect and Courage, and what it means to be a servant leader. Work on your own self to grow as a professional coach. One of the many roles that a scrum master needs to play is that of a coach for the team. What does this word ‘coach’ mean to you? How can you be a better coach? This calls for a lot of self work. This self work will help you become more patient, a better listener, help you have more compassion, along with firmness. It will help you gain skills of conflict resolution, etc. and contribute towards developing good Scrum Master characteristics! Ideally, spend at least 4-5 years playing the Scrum Master role in its full capacity if you want to further your career in the same direction (from good to great). Don’t rush through the learning process. This will expose you to a variety of situations, challenges and problems, and help you tackle each circumstance as a coach and a change agent. Understand the essence of what is really expected from this role. Meet all your challenges as a Scrum Master to the best of your abilities, but never feel discouraged. Such an attitude will help you develop qualities of a good Scrum Master. One of the expectations from a Scrum Master is to challenge the status quo. Try to understand what this really means. As I started taking on the Scrum Master role many years ago, I fell in love with it. I came face to face with this phrase, “challenge the status quo”, and what it personally meant to me (after thinking a lot) is to never give up. It does not matter how many attempts you have made to coach a stakeholder (executive, manager, leader or a team member), the energy you put in each attempt should not be impacted if previous attempts did not bring about a change you desired. Even if they ignore you or fail to understand you, go back to them with the same kindness and firmness, and patiently coach them at the next chance that you get. This is similar to the metaphor of an ant trying to climb a wall. The ant may fall 20 times, but you do not see the ant rushing or giving up, it patiently goes back and tries to climb the same wall, until it finally reaches its destination. It’s the exact same thing that happens when you are a very patient, passionate, compassionate, and dispassionate scrum master. You will not feel discouraged because you got a “no”. You will go back the next time and very kindly help them understand from another angle the value of what you are trying to coach and what it brings to your organization, department or team. This is very important to understand. Too much passion can bring frustration in you and anger in others, so you need to make sure that the river of passion needs to stay between the two banks of compassion and dispassion. You will start to see that people are listening to you more, and you will be able to influence people more positively. People will soon start seeing you as a Scrum Evangelist and will reach out to you for guidance when other avenues do not show much encouragement and support Another tip would be to look into acquiring certifications. Do not see a certification as something that will help you prove your value to others, that the certification is the reason why you are good. Rather, look at it as a means to validate your knowledge or current level. You are already good, that’s why you have that certification. This is where most people need to understand the difference between the two approaches. Let your success with the Scrum Master role justify your certifications, and not use certifications to prove that you are great. But do go for certifications, there is nothing wrong with it! Have you noticed there are two kinds of Linkedin titles? One is where people put all their certifications in their title, and the