Scrum Master is the Master Unblocker

The most common perception about the role of the scrum master is that he/she is the one to unblock every blockers or impediments that the team may encounter. This is especially true for a lot of people who just came out of scrum training or reading some scrum books. While there is some truth in this, it’s not right to take this literally.

I have also heard that it is believed that the role of scrum master is to facilitate the unblocking of the blockers. On that point, I partially agree. In my opinion everyone in the role of a scrum master must take it to the next level and equip the team with abilities to resolve the blockers themselves.

What does this mean? This means, stop hand-holding and when there are any blockers, coach the team members on how to handle those blockers. As an example: if a blocker can be solved by speaking to another person, then be a facilitator of the conversation the first time if your team member is not confident to initiate the conversation yet. Next time a similar issue arises, your team member will know who to speak to.

Remember that a scrum master is a coaching position as much as a facilitator. This is just like a sports coach, if a tennis coach saw that his player is having difficulties in the current match, he wouldn’t take over the racquet and start playing to win the match. That would have been quite silly right? What he would do is debrief and rethink of the strategy.

On that note, I believe a scrum master is not a master unblocker, rather a coach for the team so that they can solve any blockers themselves.