ScrumMaster – a model of the modern manager?7. November, 2010
Since November, I am studying in the OUBS course ‘Creativity, Cognition and Development’ which so far is really enjoyable. Yes, there are tons of materials to read, listen to, and watch. They are well-prepared and intellectually stimulating. Rather than just consuming and trying to learn things they make me think, reflect about myself, organisations, and so on.
For the first time in my studies, I decided to use computer-based MindMaps (XMind) for my personal notes instead of hand-writing into a paper notebook. So far this works really well, as I can build in all the cross-references and interrelationships much better. The material is far less sequential than in past courses.
Finally getting to the topic of this blog post: Today, I’ve read a section about ‘Creative Managers’, a term which is used for the new, modern manager:
Creative managers bring out the creativity in their staff: they stimulate and sustain an open atmosphere where a spirit of collaboration prevails, and they see part of their job as protecting a team from unnecessary obstacles (i.e. facilitating rather than controlling proceedings).
(OUBS, B822 Creativity Innovation and Change, Book 1, p. 38)
Facilitation is one central skill here, ‘acting as the conductor rather than the captain’, aiming to provide each individual an appropriate level of stretch and challenge.
All the described characteristics map very well to the role of a ScrumMaster, and also generally to agile coaches. Maybe ScrumMasters and agile coaches could be regarded as ‘early adopters’ of a new manager role, in the rather protected, closed environment of an agile project?
2 Responses to “ScrumMaster – a model of the modern manager?”
Leave a Reply
You’re right with Scrum Masters being modern managers and if an enterprise completely adopts scrum, most managers in the software development department are no longer needed. Reading “The Enterprise and Scrum” by Ken Schwaber today confirmed that not all managers are happy to become Product Owners or Scrum Masters because they love old command & control way to run things. A turnover of 20% of staff while introducing Scrum is not unusual and maybe a good number of those 20% are managers who do not like to adapt.
Well, Andreas, I think nobody will miss such managers ;-).
Susi, Mind Mapping is a tool I use more than a decade and I use it on paper and in software. XMind is a good and cost-free alternative to the MindManager. I stopped to buy MindManager upgrades, because I use mind mapping the agile way ;-). Similar to UML – where I use ArgoUML.
I think all this agile thinking helps to start a new kind of management that makes a lot of people happier. But, I do not think that we stop with the improvement of management processes. Maybe we will skip those Scrum roles in the next years and have other, but better differentiations. Scrum Master and Product Owner are pretty complex constructions with a lot of responsibilities. Do we have to think about splitting those?