046 Agile Scrum Master

[00:00:00] Hello, and welcome to the bottom up skills podcast. I mike parsons I'm the CEO of quality assurance, and we continue how dive into agile and in particular, all the people and teams and good stuff that an agile project requires. And today we're talking about the scrum master, and this is the second role that we're really examining in the.

Previous episode, we did talk a lot about the product owner, and I think it's safe to say that the scrum master is the right hand person to the product owner. So I want you to think of this role of the scrum master in an agile software project is a bit like the orchestrator. You know, standing in front of all the different media who on their own couldn't really, uh, make a [00:01:00] great song, but together they can.

And the scrum master's job is all about being flexible. And adaptive on the crazy adventures of building a brand new product. So in this episode of the podcast, we're going to dive into the world of charting, this course, uh, chatting the course of each sprint and how the scrum master removes blockers. So the team can thrive.

Sounds pretty good. Right. And if you're really interested in sort of the people in team side of agile or. Agile. It's a whole, as a set of principles and scrum, you can jump over to bottom up.io, where we've got a free master class and you can jump in there, uh, downloaded or get the deck. And we go really deep on this, but let's for now continue our dive into this world of the scrum master.

And, uh, Sutherland the author of the book, scrum, [00:02:00] uh, really framed the role of scrum master really well. Uh, in his book, a scrum, he says the scrub master. The person in charge of running the process, ask each team member three questions. What did you do yesterday to help the team finish the sprint? So that's number one.

What will you do today to help the team finish the sprint? That's number two. And number three is what obstacles are getting in your way. And that's it. That's the whole meaning every day that the scrum master has with the team and really it's at the essence of their role, everything starts with those questions.

How are you doing on this sprint? What are you hoping to do today? And what's in your way, what are your blockers? And what's really interesting is you can do that on a project or what we do quality assurance. When we run our teams beyond a project, say a [00:03:00] marketing team or sales team and ops team. Well, like what are your goals for this week?

I E the sprint and what are the blockers that you're experiencing? And it's such an efficient way to frame how you're going to work. I think it helps us work faster and work smarter, but let's get back to the scrum master this break down this role, because it's so important because what the scrum master does is the scrum master creates transparency in the project.

And in particular in the sprint. So usually two to four weeks, probably closer to two. And that transparency is like, what are we working on? And what's next, it's complete. Um, they really bring, um, uh, timely reminder to scrum values, uh, about focusing on working, uh, Product working code and really protecting the team from too [00:04:00] many variations, removing blockers, and really being the centerpiece, um, to the daily operations of a project.

And, uh, in traditional terms, if you had been a project manager or project coordinator, The scrum master is a agile and scrums answer to that same, to that same role and a great scrum master. We'll have the ability to, to organize. And I mean, this is really important, um, to see how to break down the difference between themes and epics and user stories, to understand the tools and resources and the people that are required.

It's a fascinating. Executional hands on kind of role. So if you're. Really somebody who thrives in the opportunity to get things organized and all right. I [00:05:00] think that think of people who love putting labels on things or who love organizing bookshelves, you know, people who, when you look on the server on, on your, say your Google drive, they have really well organized folders are, and that's always a great indicator of a scrum master, but I think it's more than just organization.

I think because in an agile project we're continually adapting and refining and iterating. This idea of being flexible is essential because if you're too kind of stuck in your way, which would be a very classic project management office waterfall kind of thing, uh, you're going to really struggle in an agile project because it's so iterative.

Um, and one of the key things. You'll have to consider on an agile project is really weighing out highly, uh, you know, technical or highly interpretive things such as [00:06:00] creativity, design, that sort of thing with all sorts of logic about. Time allocation of resources and so forth. So the ability to span those two worlds is really, really critical.

And as all ways, uh, as you'll hear me, you talk about a ton on bottom up skills is communication is at the heart of this. If every day the team is not connected. Through the scrum masters facilitation things can go off track real quick. So as all of these things are spinning around you, the technology, the design, the stakeholders, and all of that communication.

I think that the form of leadership that the scrum master brings is insane. Calmness. Calm under pressure and sticking to the plan because this is really, really essential. If you've got a plan for the sprint, [00:07:00] don't allow forces to come in and rock the boat. Keep everybody. You know, sometimes you just have to remind people of why we're doing it, right?

These user stories, these epics, these themes in this sprint and not others. And that's, that's a sort of, it's almost a form of protection. I'd be yeah. Teflon, coating around the team so that they can be autonomous. They can focus on the work. So let's talk about the work of a scrum Mazda. Now we've talked about, you know, managing daily standups and scrums.

We've talked about all of the communication and the resource planning, making sure that user stories are planned well in the backlog. I want to find what I think a complete. Sort of Ninja like scrum master looks like, and when I've seen and worked with great scrum masters, sort of three [00:08:00] things that they, they do, which make them.

The cream of the crop. The first one is that they, they really get into the planning of the sprint and they get the teams buying contributions to what's in, in terms of the user stories. And I think that they are constantly aware of what must be in the product and what is nice to have and having that ability to plan the sprint like that.

Creates enormous comfort for all the team members, but real clarity. So people are not, you know, weighing up ambiguous or challenging, um, topics. There's a lot of clarity about what we must have. So planning the sprint is the first one. The second one is creating a rhythm now. What's really important is when you bring all these talented people pulled together, you've got to kind of create, um, a sense [00:09:00] of harmony, rhythm and momentum.

And it can take a little while to get going. And if you're a scrum master, there's all sorts of things you can do. And here's what I see. Great scrum masters do. Number one is they catered at individual work styles. Me, for example. I do my best and deep work in the mornings. So I hate, hate, uh, sync up meetings, scrums, uh, stand ups in the morning that interrupt my quality time.

That's just me personally, but a great scrum master will kind of try and adapt and worked around the individual work styles. Uh, you know, I'm working with someone at the moment who does their best work quite late in the evening. So I just, um, you know, wait for the goodies in the morning. The second part of this creating a rhythm is making sure that we're always aligned about.

What Matt is, [00:10:00] um, how we're working and why this scrum demo product is important. And, um, This rhythm, uh, is created because you're highly aligned around those things. So you can't neglect. Um, you know, if you're a good scrum master, you can be in the details, but you actually, you know, it's funny, you have to remind people of why we're building this product.

It's highly underrated as a driver of people that creates momentum. And lastly, obviously you should have your daily standups or scrums, but the other thing. That the attention of the scrum master must go to his working sessions between, uh, different individuals. That's really important. And lastly, the third thing, so the first two, let's just recap.

They play in the spring and they create the rhythm. Okay. So imagine those things are taking place. Now it's time for the third one, they actually track the work. And my simple test here is a great [00:11:00] scrum master. Doesn't receive a document. Or, um, a, a prototype or design or get an update from a developer that they've committed a new, uh, feature or Epic, um, and just say, Oh, cool.

And pass on the information. I think the true test of a scrum master is they actually look inside the document, the container, they actually look at the code, um, And I can't tell you that this attends and to the work itself, making sure, sure. That if someone said, yeah, I'll get you the designs for that Epic, that they don't received the zip file on 49, unzip it look through and.

Check it for a couple of, of the key criteria to which you're building this product. This is essential. And if things are complex, the other thing in this idea of tracking the work is [00:12:00] you can get peer review done. And, um, I think it's essential, uh, to make sure that if someone's just built, uh, A database, make sure you get one of the other developers, not necessarily in your product, but in the organization.

Take a look at the architecture and to give feedback, um, great way to improve the quality of the work. And lastly, in terms of tracking the work, sometimes it's a little too easy to reduce or even cut testing because you're up against a tight deadline. Don't cut testing. That's a great way to ensure the work is good too.

So. That's a scrum master planning, sprints, creating rhythm, and really tracking the work. I hope what you can see here is that the scrum master is just the orchestrator, the, the person that gets things humming. And if they are doing a great job, not only. Do the individual team [00:13:00] members get time and space to do the things that they're best at, but the product owner has the data, has the work, has the effort in order to weigh up.

Are we building a great product? And that in the end is what it's all about. So I hope you've enjoyed this little journey into the world of a scrum master. If it sounds like you, you should jump into our master class@bottomup.io, if it sounds like someone you need in the team. Well, we're going to be talking about more members of the team in the following episode.

So you can always go into our back catalog of the bottom up skills podcast. And here's talking about all the tools and people required to do agile software. Develop it. Okay. That's a wrap of this episode of the bottom up skills podcast. We'll catch you next time.