In one of my Agile workshops with a client recently I had one of the most revealing exercises around the term “Servant Leadership” to a bunch of ScrumMasters.
Almost all of my participants in the workshop (about 8 people) had never previously heard of the term “servant leader.” I asked the group what feelings they had around the term. Their responses sent chills up my spine…
“Harsh.”
“I don’t like the term. At our company this isn’t acceptable.”
“When I think about the words, I don’t like it. The word ‘servant’ turns me off.’
“We don’t use those words here. It doesn’t fit into our culture.”
I had known that the client environment was a place of fear. A place where mistakes were not acceptable, and management was very controlling. I had no idea of the toll it had taken on their employees.
ScrumMasters who don’t believe in servant leadership
The fact is: If your… catalysts for positive change (i.e. YOUR SCRUMMASTERS) do not believe in servant leadership, you’re pretty much screwed… well. Not really. There is potential for this to change… but it will be a very hard, long, and up-hill battle with the entire system.
What was so revealing to me was that the ScrumMaster’s responses were so indicative of the cultural dysfunctions at play.
When your ScrumMasters say they don’t believe in servant leadership… it’s time to look in the mirror and really reflect on your company culture.
Deanna DiCristo (1)
Himali (1)
I fear, you’re absolutely right. As long as fear is the main driver within an organization it’s really hard to create trust and transparency. Learning and improving becomes nearly impossible because to learn you’ve to make mistakes. And that is not accepted in such environments.
Totally agree. Not entirely impossible… but will have to engage with the upper leadership. This will be a long road…
I’m not surprised that they weren’t aware of Servant Leadership. It isn’t part of the CSM core curriculum, nor anything that is normally taught through standard educational forums.
The reactions without a doubt are scary, but I would imagine that 90% of organizations would have a culture that would react the same way.
There is a reason STOOS was created in the first place. There is a reason why it and many other movements (Radical Management, Rightshifting, etc) are having trouble getting traction.
This command and control culture is thousands of years old, deeply embedded and re-enforced as we grow up by both our parents and teachers. Only when our parenting and educational styles change will we see a dramatic shift back to critical thinking and consequently other ways to get results.
Dang… so what you’re telling me, Renee… is I’m a product of my parents? DAMMIT! Where is the reset button?
Servant leadership as a skill set is also not listed in the key skills required from a ScrumMaster in many places and even if it is listed, it is way down the list of key skills required. Hence, as you correctly said, when scrummasters don’t believe in servant leadership, it is a direct reflection of the corporate culture that impedes an environment that should nurture trust and openness in the organization. However, as Deming said – Survival is not mandatory and if the reality is ignored, the consequences can lead to difficult circumstances for the organization…..
I’ve lately started referring to my role as “concierge.” It just sounds so … French.
lol
Hi Peter,
Looks like you have a bit of work ahead of you with this team / org but I’m sure you’re up to it.
There are organisations out there who are even hiring for ScrumMasters and don’t seem to understand what the role entails. Sure the job ad talks about all the typical things standups, retrospectives, sprint planning etc but the rest of the ad seems to miss the point completely on the attitudes and abilities that are required.
A great talk that dovetails well with this blog post is this one by Ilan Goldstein at this year’s Agile Australia 2012 conference. He covers servant leadership and also has a hilarious look at some real job ads for ScrumMasters.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJG0rTFFuVg
Enjoy!