Scrum Roles
Purpose of the game
To facilitate a discussion about the team roles or to teach people what the different roles on high level mean and to explain the stances of a Scrum Master.
Especially the Scrum Master role is easily misunderstood. Sometimes even by Scrum Masters :)
How to play
Put the Scrum Master, Product Owner and Development team cards next to each other on a table or on the floor.
Shuffle the statement cards and hand them over to the attendees (if you have a large group you could split them in smaller groups with a smaller stack of cards).
Let the group(s) discuss on to which role the statement on a card belongs “if you HAVE to choose and nobody else would do it”.
Optional addition
In the end, when all statements are on the table, you can also invite the team to dot-vote where they think the current real-life situation differs from what the cards say. Take the card (or top three cards) with the most dots and discuss what the first step to improve could be.
Cheat sheet
| Development Team | Product Owner | Scrum Master |
|---|---|---|
| Measures and improves quality | Can act on all levels | Impediment remover |
| Practices backlog refinement | Is familiar with the market | Servant Leader |
| Decides how work is done | Is well informed | Change Agent |
| Decides how much work a story is | Thinks in functionalities | Coach |
| Decides who does what | Is available | Facilitator |
| Prevents technical debt | Represents product vision | Teacher |
| Cross functional | Shares Experiences | |
| Selects work for the sprint | Acts as an entrepreneur | |
| Is transparent about progress | Masters User Story Mapping | |
| Has mandate | ||
| Prioritizes backlog | ||
| Can say ‘no’ | ||
| Prefers personal communication |
Trick questions
Having the discussion about these trick questions is more important than the outcome, but here are a few suggestions on possible outcomes.
| Statement | Role |
|---|---|
| Team Boss | Not applicable |
| Daily Scrum Boss | If any, it would be the Dev Team since they are the only ones that must attend |
| Scrum Police | Not applicable |
| System Admin (Jira/TFS/Jenkins...) | Not applicable, or 'everybody who feels like it' |
| Super Hero | Nobody or everybody |
| Manager | Nobody, or if you look at it from the focus on personal growth perspective and mentoring: the Scrum Master |
| Secretary/Scribe | Everybody when needed |
| Delighting customers | Everybody but if you have to choose, Product owner |