Certopolis

Project Management Professional (PMP)

Servant leadership for the PMP: what the Scrum Master does

The Scrum Guide describes Scrum Masters as true leaders who serve the Scrum Team and the larger organization. They lead by coaching, removing impediments and barriers, and helping people understand Scrum, not by assigning work or deciding how it is done.

Who the Scrum Master serves

The Scrum Guide lists three groups. The Scrum Team: coaching members in self-management and cross-functionality, helping them focus on high-value Increments that meet the Definition of Done, causing the removal of impediments, and making sure all Scrum events happen, stay positive and productive, and keep to their timebox.

The Product Owner: helping find techniques for defining the Product Goal and managing the Product Backlog, and facilitating stakeholder collaboration as requested or needed. The organization: leading, training and coaching its Scrum adoption, and removing barriers between stakeholders and Scrum Teams.

Serving is not directing

Scrum Teams are self-managing: they decide internally who does what, when and how. A servant leader who hands out tasks, sets a rota or tells the Developers how to build an item takes that decision away from them.

So when a PMP scenario shows a team problem, the servant-leader answer usually builds the team's own ability or clears something in its way. Example: all testing waits for one Developer and the others say testing is not their job. Assigning testing tasks in rotation solves it by direction. Coaching the Developers to share testing builds cross-functionality, which is the Scrum Master's job.

Removing impediments and barriers

The Scrum Guide says the Scrum Master causes the removal of impediments. That wording matters: the Scrum Master makes sure the impediment goes, which can mean acting directly or getting the right person to act.

Barriers outside the team count too. If a compliance department will only answer through formal written requests and that stalls every Sprint, the Scrum Master works with that department to remove the barrier. Planning around the delay or asking for faster written replies leaves the barrier in place.

Where the exam catches people

  • Believing servant leadership means doing whatever the team asks: the Scrum Master is accountable for the team's effectiveness and for establishing Scrum as the Scrum Guide defines it.
  • Believing the Scrum Master assigns tasks to keep work moving: the Developers decide who does what, when and how.
  • Believing the Scrum Master serves only the team: the Scrum Guide also lists ways it serves the Product Owner and the wider organization.
  • Believing the best fix for a skills gap is to add a specialist or set a rota: the Scrum Guide's first answer is coaching the team in cross-functionality.

Written from PMI's documentation

Try 3 questions on this

Pick an answer to see why each option is right or wrong.

  1. A functional manager is taking on the Scrum Master accountability and asks what kind of leadership the Scrum Guide expects in the role. Which of the following describes it?

    Right. In the game that’s Renown for your People building.

    Not that one: C is right. In the game your People building would lose a little Renown, and this question would come back later.

    Written from scrumguides.org/scrum-guide.html

  2. On a Scrum project, a compliance department answers the Scrum Team only through formal written requests, which stalls progress for days each Sprint. The project manager serves as Scrum Master. Which of the following should the project manager do?

    Right. In the game that’s Renown for your People building.

    Not that one: A is right. In the game your People building would lose a little Renown, and this question would come back later.

    Show the full explanation and doc quotes

    The written-only channel is such a barrier, so the project manager, as Scrum Master, works with the compliance department to remove it.

    Written from scrumguides.org/scrum-guide.html

  3. On a Scrum Team where the project manager serves as Scrum Master, all testing waits for one Developer, and the other Developers say testing is not their job. Which of the following should the project manager do?

    Right. In the game that’s Renown for your People building.

    Not that one: D is right. In the game your People building would lose a little Renown, and this question would come back later.

    Show the full explanation and doc quotes

    Coaching the Developers to share testing does that; assigning a rota would solve it by direction.

    Written from scrumguides.org/scrum-guide.html