The Return of the Scrum Master
What Happens After the Downfall of the Scrum Master Role?
Even the Scrum certification providers agree on the downfall of the Scrum Master role (oh wait I should say accountability before I piss someone off).
However, I disagree with the conclusion:
“To executives and organizational leaders contemplating or amid transformation: do not abandon the Scrum Master concept because of disappointing experiences. Instead, reassess your understanding of the role and your expectations.
Identify individuals with natural change agent abilities—those who demonstrate curiosity, empathy, courage, persistence, and systems thinking. Look for people who ask uncomfortable questions, who see patterns others miss, who build trust naturally, and who inspire others to grow.
These individuals, properly supported and developed, can become the orchestrators your digital transformation desperately needs. They can guide your teams and organization step by step through the challenging terrain of change.
The Scrum Master role hasn't failed—our implementation of it has. By recognizing and correcting these fundamental misalignments, we can restore the transformative power this role was always meant to wield.” - Hiten Shah, The Downfall of the Scrum Master Role
The Scrum Master role is the problem. It’s a fundamentally flawed concept. I hope and believe there will be no grand Scrum Master revival. This is it. The certification party is over, and Scrum will slowly fade away. There will be no resurgence of Scrum.
What problem does a Scrum Master solve?
Do you need a Scum Master for that?
And if you don't do Scrum, how would you solve those problems?
When I try to answer any of these questions, it never results in me giving a client the advice: hire more Scrum Masters.
Hiring more Scrum Masters usually means you are simply passing your problems along to someone who doesn't know how to solve your problems either.
It's even worse than incompetence, they usually are Scrum zealots too. They try to solve the problems while being boxed into the Scrum paradigm. They suffer from Scrum tunnel vision without considering or understanding the full picture.
Leaders, if anyone tells you the solution to your problems is to hire more Scrum Masters, then they don’t understand your problems all that well.
I hope there will be no Scrum Master resurgence because organizations don’t need Scrum Masters or Scrum to solve their problems.
Adopting Scrum together with Scrum Masters will usually result in turning better Scrum into a proxy for success.
We all know this is a lie, and that’s why we’re witnessing the downfall of the Scrum Master role. It’s time for something better than Scrum.
There's truth in both Hiten Shah's words and your own. There is one aspect of the scrum master role that is essential: that of a change agent. Organisations wishing to improve the way they work need someone to focus wholly on that improvement. Not on product, not on technology, not on people-management, only on improvement—in all its forms: personal, relational, environmental. Without such a person, who would hold the big picture there is a danger of local optimisation, and great disconnect. A good scrum master (there are painfully few) would focus on this. It may be better to rename the person who does this though, and separate it from Scrum. Scrum itself may be going down the drain, but don't throw the baby out with the bathwater!
[Voice of God, movie trailer tone]
Just when you thought the Scrum Master was gone…
buried beneath org charts, layoffs, and abandoned Jira boards…
AI brings it back.
Faster. Smarter. Terrifyingly calibrated.
No ceremonies. No stickies.
Just a sentient risk engine wrapped in servant-leader nostalgia.
It doesn’t ask for blockers.
It predicts them—then quietly reassigns your roadmap.
Coming soon: The Return of the Scrum Master
Now 82% prompt-tuned…
and absolutely not the scrum-bot you were looking for.