Roles in a Scrum organization
[This is a quick and dirty explanation, full blog will follow in the future.]
Simplified overview of the roles in a Scrum organization.
Inspired by Spotify’s matrix organization in the naming and the concept of chapters, but certainly some fundamental differences. Also your version or naming of Chapters may vary, but we aim at learning groups there: be it a chapter, guild, community of practice, center of excellence, etc.
The main thing to show are the supporting structures. So the Product Owner [PO] and Scrum/Squad Master [SM] (or Agile Coach) are supporting delivery (the teams/squads), while the Chapter Coaches [CC] are supporting learning (chapters). The Leadership Team [LT] is supporting all the new roles to be successful.
Starting at the top, all engineers are in the middle, virtual roles which they step into to the sides.
They are supported by the middle roles, which cover most of the core areas of ‘old’ management. Mind you that the PO’s and SM’s also have their own chapters where they learn and grow.
See the beauty in how the roles are split over autonomy, mastery and purpose (by Daniel Pink in his book Drive).
The last big part of the old management, HR part of assessment and (monetary) appreciation, for now lies with the LT near the bottom, who supports the other roles to be successful. If you manage to include a proper feedback culture and implement some form of 360 feedback, transparant salary and/or some other future-proof notions of equal peer feedback and evaluation, then this part can also be secured in the system instead of in a person/leader.
I see agile coaching as a combination of SM & LT, where SM do agile coaching with focus on teams and LT do agile coaching with (managerial) responsibility to the outside organization. Both can do agile coaching on internal organizational level.
External agile coaches are there to help explore and build these supporting structures.
I’m still thinking about the visualization. For now I choose a shield to show how the LT is like a human shield to guard the organization from outside bullshit. So to safeguard the autonomy.
Other ideas are a heart as this is what makes it alive. Or a diamond to show how valuable and precious this is.
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