Growing Scrum Masters and Coaches (Babylon)

The Team

• Sam Birkinshaw
• Candi Champness
• Peter Hundermark
• Andrea Tomasini
• Jonathan Whittaker
• Philipp Eisbacher
• Jon Gedge
• Marius De Beer
• Sam Whiting
• David Lowe (SM)
• Paul Goddard (PO)

The Vision

“Supporting the people who will be the flag-bearers of transforming the world of work”

Sprint 1 : Skills Growth

The 10+ Skills Growth Backlog

This is designed to be the next steps for a new Scrum Master following training course. Instead of checking their emails, prioritse which of these skills are most important to develop in their new role.

1. Facilitation – “to enable a group of people to achieve a goal within a given constraint”
2. Questioning – “to make you an effective servant to the team, and empower the team”
3. Listening – “the key to communication, and key to a Scrum Master’s success”
4. Teaching – “to help people try new things. Setting a common foundation and language”
5. Observing – “to spot non-verbal signals and uncover the hidden truth”
6. Motivating – “to encourage the team to want to improve”
7. Managing Conflict – “to face conflict and encourage the team to extract positives from it”
8. Collaborating – “pooling individuals time, skills and expertise to the service of the team, for the team”
9. Leading – “align different people on the same journey (direction)”
10. Influencing – “to encourage change and drive improvements through overcoming objections and maintaining a positive direction”
11. [ENTER YOUR OWN] – “identify at least one other skill you feel the need to improve, and consider why that is important and what value it will bring your team”

Once prioritised develop your own skills growth plan as an iterative experiment, setting goals within time boxes appropriate to your own learning desire and capacity.

Sprint 2: Communities

Sprint Goal: “fashion a model for Scrum Masters to find, support and mentor each other across organisations”

The Scrum Master Exchange – “based on the exchange programme common in schools, two Scrum Masters can link up and share time with each Scrum team to share experiences and provide peer-to-peer support” 

The Mentorship Programme – “providing inexperienced practitioners a chance to contact, link and learn from those willing to help within the community”