Are ‘Agile Coach’ and ‘SCRUM Master’ Being Deprecated?

A Reddit post with many sharing the same view: “The need for a full-time coaching role has greatly diminished.” However, I believe that many (if not all) software teams still need a REAL Agile Coach w

I came across this Reddit post from Cliff Berg’s comment. (Cliff is the lead author of Agile 2: The Next Iteration of Agile).

For people who currently are working as ‘Agile Coach’ or ‘Scrum Master’ and believe you’re helping your teams practice true Agile, scroll to the bottom of this article. There, you’ll find quotes from the creators of Agile and Scrum, which can help you perform a quick self-assessment.

Summary of the Post and its Reviews

I have reviewed the post content and all comments; here is a summary of the key views:

1. The job market is bad.

• “I’ve been trying to get a new job for months now and the market seems terrible.” (the post)

• “This job market is as bad as I have ever seen” [Thump604]

• “I think the gravy train is over. … Throughout the length of 2023, each of my clients dried up. My most prominent client got rid of everything agile when they hired a very anti-agile engineering manager. He said there was no value and poof, that was it.” [his_rotundity_]

2. There is no need for an ‘Agile Coach’ or ‘Scrum Master’ as they don’t deliver value.

• “A company I worked at eliminated every single scrum master role. There was quite literally 0 impact in our day to day. Sadly the position is just not needed” [NoNeutralNed]

• “The need for a full-time coaching role has greatly diminished. [rewddit]”

• “I fear the free ride for “Agile” is over.” [ThePsychicCEO]

• “Our company cut about 75% of scrum master roles. Previously each team had a dedicated one now 1 scrum master covers 2 or 3 teams. Honestly, there has been pretty much zero impact from this at all.” [The_Great_Jrock]

3. Agile Coaches or Scrum Masters seem to be doing useless stuff.

• “Our previous scrummaster would really just run the stand-up and other ceremonies” [The_Great_Jrock]

• “I’m tired of anyone in tech meetings with nothing to add except asking when things are done. Be done faster if you replace him with another dev” [punkouter23]

My View on This

The job market is currently tough, but there will still be quite some hiring activity for roles that add good value. There are reasons for the trend of having fewer Agile coaches or Scrum Masters.

A recent study claimed that “Agile with 268% higher failure rates.” I disagree (see the article).