Many companies view employees as cogs in a wheel that exist only to help the organization advance its goals. Leaders act as taskmasters who distribute authority and don’t care how work gets done, as long as it’s delivered on time.
The Scrum Master is by nature a transformational agenda. By effectively assuming this identity and truly understanding what this role represents, the Scrum Master starts to act in the three universes detailed by the Scrum Guide: with the Product Owner, with the development team, and with the organization.
First and foremost, the Scrum Guide states that the Scrum Master must be responsible for ensuring that Scrum is understood and applied as a whole in the corporation to which it is being implemented.
To fulfill this role with mastery, whoever wants to become a differentiated Scrum Master must have very refined technical skills.
With a sober, transparent, and caring profile, the Scrum Master is one of the key leaders in the development of software or other products that adopt Agile. Much more than just giving orders, this character is responsible for organizing the team during Sprints and helping the team find solutions to the obstacles that inevitably arise.
In this article, you will figure out the role of servant leadership and its connection with a Scrum master. Do they fit together?
The Scrum Master working for the Product Owner
Of course, the Scrum Master must work very closely with the Product Owner. A team has a lot to gain by working with a Product Owner that has a great understanding of what value is for their business and especially for their final target audience. If this Product Owner masters concepts of agility and knowledge of Scrum and product management.
These are the Scrum definitions for Product Owner:
Finding techniques for effective Product Backlog management;
Communicate the vision, objective, and items of the Product Backlog to the Development Team;
Teach the Scrum Team to create Product Backlog items clearly and concisely;
Understand the long-term Product planning in the empirical environment;
Understand and practice agility; and, Facilitate Scrum events as required or needed.
The Scrum Master working for the Development Team
The role of the Scrum master with the development team is presented in a very strong way in two pillars: people and processes. In this sense, our servant leader must always be attentive to keeping the process in a continuous improvement flow at full speed and the team’s motivation and engagement high. That’s why GitScrum’s Rock Star Team is perfect for those who want a competitive environment among members to bring more productive results.
These are the Scrum guide definitions regarding performance:
Train the Development Team in self-management and interdisciplinarity;
Teach and lead the Development Team in creating high-value products;
Remove impediments to the Development Team’s progress;
Facilitate Scrum events as required or needed;
The Scrum Master working for the organization
Most companies that aim at agile transformation get stuck on cultural issues rooted in organizations. In this way, the Scrum Master must be the great Scrum seller for the entire organization.
The following are definitions from the Scrum Guide regarding the role of the Scrum master with the organization:
Leading and training the organization in adopting Scrum;
Planning Scrum implementations within the organization;
Helping employees and stakeholders understand and apply Scrum and empirical product development;
Causing changes that increase the Scrum Team’s productivity;
Working with other Scrum Masters to increase the effectiveness of applying Scrum in organizations.
What is Servant Leadership?
The greatest quality of a leader is adaptability, he must be able to read each moment and adapt to each context that presents itself. And GitScrum’s Sprints is the right tool for you to increase productivity while you see your daily tasks getting shaped.
At certain times, the team may need a Leader Coach, to help discover new paths, at other times, some members of the team may need a more servant leader, at other times, a more authoritative leader may be needed.
Servant Leadership is nothing more than a form of management in which the leader focuses on the needs of his team members, even before considering his own.
Listen
Have active listening, start listening more to the people who are close to you, notice what they say and do, study about Non-Violent Communication and be able to communicate in the best way with each person.
Empathy
Empathize with people, understand that each one has a different life and goes through different situations or times, no one is better than anyone else.
Assistance
Have a team spirit with your co-workers, provide support in your activities, and always try to provide feedback on your day-to-day.
Empowerment of people
Commit to helping people become empowered, both on a personal, academic, and professional level. Look for alternatives that will make them grow and stand out in any situation or work they are doing.
Community
Keep in mind that it is not possible to achieve all of your goals alone, it is much better when you have an empowered and engaged community to help you. You can do this within your organization.
As you can see, these are individual features, but anyone can learn them and put them into practice.
Persuasion
Sophisticated sales tactics can emerge when you think about persuasion. But that’s not what we’re talking about here. Servant leaders use persuasion to gain consensus and gain buy-in from their team. In this way, everyone feels that they have an interest in the team’s success.
Forecast
Another important aspect of servant leadership is taking the knowledge you’ve learned in the past. Applying it to the future so that you and your team can continue to grow.
Post-mortems or project retrospectives are a great tool to find out what worked. So you can adjust your process with each project.
You need to learn that the “top-down” model no longer achieves positive results. You must change your mindset to a horizontal culture, in which your employees will help you much more to achieve your goals.
GitScrum supports your team to better results and effective deliveries!
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