YDS: Which Scrum Master Stance Do You Use the Most?

Does Your Management and Leadership Team Support Scrum? Let's explore the options this situation presents. All of this and more are discussed in today's episode of Your Daily Scrum with Todd Miller and Ryan Ripley.

Professional Scrum Trainers Todd Miller and Ryan Ripley built this course to help those interested in Scrum get up and running quickly using the Framework. They've partnered with Daria Bagina from ScrumMastered to bring practical materials and guides to the course.

Todd and Ryan also co-authored a book - Fixing Your Scrum: Practical Solutions to Common Scrum Problems.

For more information about Agile for Humans, visit:

For more information about Daria and ScrumMastered:

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[kdiggity]

Hey, Ryan and Todd, I want to thank you for all the great content, courses and community you have created. I have learned so much from it and know it's a lot of hard work to make all that happen! I especially loved your EBM series, and please help me to buy Will Seele a beer or coffee. Thanks!

[agilekyle]

Thanks Todd and Ryan for the continuously good content for our continuous improvement! You two have become staples in my journey to better myself as a SM to better serve my team and organization!

[tomaszniemiec]

Facilitator, teacher and coach, those would be the ones I often find myself using the most. Facilitator on meetings and events like user story mapping, or event storming alike sessions. Coach for impediments I know the team has the means to resolve, they just don't know it and require a slight (sometimes it's a kick) push into the correct direction. Teacher when I need to do a workshop or training for the team or within the organisation. I would also say...Consultant, when brainstorming ideas to help someone who comes for advice.

[stevecomenzo]

Question for a future topic: Should a team do "Sprint 0"?

[g-ronnmendoza]

Can you recommend a “Facilitation” course (if any) that can help us improve in this stance?

[jeroennollet]

I've chosen 'Coach' because I like to work with the team towards a better way of working. Maybe I chose the wrong option for this reason then?

I don't 'favor' Change Agent because, as a consultant, I always end up in 'Scaled' environments where the Scrum Master is thought of as nothing more than a facilitator. I start very ambitiously: trying to contact middle management, checking what they lack, and how I can help (trying to be a change agent). 

However, these people were never interested in talking to a Scrum Master. I was once told to just mind the team and they'll mind the 'alignment' of the rest of the organization. Resulting in a common way of working, without focus on delivery, just making sure that everyone uses the same process. Regardless of the context of the team.

I know for sure this wouldn't be the case in smaller companies because I've had the honor to be a consultant in such a company once. I definitely had a broader role to play there. Unfortunately, these companies usually don't want to hire consultants for their open job offerings.

So the comment of 'Coach is kinda nonsense, it's mostly consultants' was a bit harsh, I think. I do like to take up this task, but I'm just put on the sideline by the client. I start like this with each new client, but in vain. That's why I don't 'favor' it anymore: I don't get the chance so I don't get to taste how it feels to be a change agent.

[tomaszgrygoruk]

I have voted for the Change Agent as a stance and the others stances : Teacher, Coach, Impediments Remover, Facilitator are activities needed to change. Feeling in your heart that you are triggering a change you can help to grow : people, teams, departments, organization and that is why I see SM a Change Agent.
RR : Thank you for the word 'Mentor' because I hate coaching. I love to inspire and the Mentor sounds really much better.

PS. If we want to light fire in people we have to burn.

[danieljohnson]

Coach - SM should be the expert, so coaching team members to increase scrum skills (correct stories, acceptance criteria, tasks, etc..) is vital

[kensaiyeahyeah]

To me the coaching stance is close to the teaching stance. The main difference being teaching is about providing answers and coaching about helping others finding their own answers.

[dmitryshastitko]

Facilitator - without building working processes and continuos improvement Scrum may become not so Scrum