As a trained psychologist and Scrum Master, my goal today is to give you valuable insights on how to give effective feedback to your Scrum Masters. We will focus on five key performance KPIs to ensure that your Scrum Master is not only following the agile vision but also delivering short-term results.
You can find out more about these 5 Scrum Master Performance KPIs here: 5 Scrum Master Performance KPIs.
Scrum Master Feedback | Performance Review Comments
A few tips for your performance review
Below you can see the 5 general areas by which you can measure the performance of a Scrum Master. You can use this as a framework to structure your feedback.
Tip: It can be useful to ask the Scrum Master for a self-assessment before you communicate your own thoughts.
It can also be extremely valuable if you briefly ask colleagues in writing to collect example situations that can help you give feedback comments. Of course, it also helps to briefly go through the relevant ideas in a conversation so that you really understand them. Any information that can be categorized into the 5 categories below could be helpful.
1. Sprint Goals Delivery: Delivering what was promised
An agile team thrives on successful sprints. When giving feedback to your scrum master, emphasize the importance of consistently achieving goals. How has this been going recently and how much influence has the scrum master had?
2. Continuous improvement: Promoting the Continuous Improvement process
Agile's project management thrives on continuous improvement. Can you list some of them? Example: "Your initiative to implement better agile retrospectives has led to measurable improvements, as the team has reported to me."
3. Trust: Trust as the basis for success
Trust is the cement of agile teams. Feedback to your scrum master should question whether and how the trust between product owners, release train engineers (in the case of SAFe), stakeholders and software developers has subjectively changed. Example: "Your open communication style creates an environment of trust. Since we briefly look at the Jira board together in the weekly meeting, I have noticed how the team's commitment to its maintenance has improved."
4. Team Satisfaction: A satisfied team is a productive team
Happy team members are productive team members. Give your Scrum Master feedback on how they influence team engagement. The same applies here as above: The best data for good feedback comes from talking to team members and other colleagues who can give you examples.
5. Delivering Value: Focus on value-oriented action
Agile's project management aims to deliver value. This means that, in the end, the team's performance must be measured precisely against this. The Scrum Master only has a limited influence on this – but he does have an influence! So a question to the Scrum Master can be: How do you think your influence has affected this so far? What are your future goals?
Scrum Master 360 degree feedback: a holistic view
Optionally, the 360-degree perspective can also be useful for comprehensive feedback – i.e. feedback from the PO, external stakeholders, other Scrum Masters and the team. 360-degree feedback has advantages and disadvantages – but if you are serious about it, it can definitely be an option. My tip from above also applies here: You could develop questions for the 360 degree feedback based on the 5 success metrics.
The Echometer tool can also help you with this – more on this below.
Scrum Master Feedback | Performance Review Comments
Inspiration for specific 1-on-1 feedback comments
Performance feedback example: lack of transparency in communication
- Feedback: "I have noticed that not all relevant information is always shared transparently in the sprint meetings. How could we improve communication?"
Performance feedback example: Lack of involvement of all team members
- Feedback: "Some team members may not feel fully involved in decision-making processes. How can we ensure that all team members can contribute their perspectives and actively participate in shaping the work process?"
Performance feedback example: Overload of individual team members
- Feedback: "It seems like some team members are overloaded while others have less work. Could we work together to develop strategies to better distribute the workload and ensure that all team members are equally challenged?"
Performance Review Comment: Difficulties in the self-organization of the team
- Feedback: "It seems that the team has difficulty organizing itself and working autonomously. How can we strengthen self-organization and ensure that each team member takes responsibility and contributes to the overall success?"
Performance Review Comment: Unclear objectives and priorities
- Feedback: "Sometimes there seems to be a lack of clarity regarding priorities and goals. Maybe you could structure the sprint planning a little differently? How could we ensure that the team goals are clearly defined and that all team members understand which tasks are priorities?"
Performance Review Commentary: Effective team communication
- Positive feedback: "I appreciate the clear and open communication in the team that you have encouraged through your regular meeting icebreakers. The regular stand-up meetings and sharing of progress have helped to ensure that all team members regularly have a smile on their face."
Performance Review Comment: High team motivation and cohesion
- Positive feedback: "It's great to see how committed and motivated the team is since you ask more often: What actually went well?
Performance Review Comment: High team performance despite challenges
- Positive feedback: "The team has achieved impressive results despite some challenges. The cooperation and commitment of each individual is tangible. How could we use these positive experiences to successfully overcome future challenges?"
Feedback Comment: Collaborative decision-making
- Positive feedback: "The way the team makes decisions together is impressive. The involvement of all team members leads to well-founded decisions and a shared understanding. How could we further promote this participative approach?"
Scrum Master Feedback | Performance Review Comments
Data-driven improvement of Scrum Master performance
One of the most helpful sources of constructive Scrum Master feedback is, of course, the digital tools used, such as Jira or DevOps. Some metrics can be read out there.
To have structured data, you can also use a special tool that Scrum Masters usually love: Echometer.
Echometer is a digital tool that helps agile team leads with agile retrospectives and team Health Checks. Whether remote, hybrid or on-site: it makes team coaching measurable and professionalizes your work while saving you a lot of work. Just take a look at our website to find out more: www.echometerapp.com.
By the way: Since we have a large library of psychologically based questions, our tool can probably also help you to develop a good Scrum Master 360 degree feedback.
And one more thing: regular 1-to-1 meetings or coaching sessions with your colleagues can have a decisive effect on your team performance. And they can even be data-driven! If you are interested in the topic in more detail, take a look here: Here you will find 129 one-to-one meeting (or appraisal interview) questions and Here are the 3 best one-on-one meeting tools in comparison.
"Usually, all Scrum coaches are very open to making their own work more measurable - e.g. with Echometer."
Scrum Master Feedback | Performance Review Comments
Conclusion - Scrum Master Feedback Performance Comments
Finally, another quick hint: If you would like to know how it feels to develop your team with our tool: You can start an agile retrospective below without logging in, in this case the "Keep, Stop, Start" workshop.
Alternatively, simply forward our website to the responsible colleagues: www.echometerapp.com.
A general note: If you are responsible for regular growth and operational one-to-one conversations with your team members, I recommend the following: Below you will find an example template for the many interactive possibilities in the 1:1 tool Echometer to conduct better and more efficient coaching conversations. Take a look at it:
1:1 Meeting Tool Template: Mood as weather
- If you had to describe your emotional state as the weather, how is the weather in your project or your tasks at the moment?
How is the weather in relation to your employer, your personal life and your private life?
1:1 Meeting Tool Template: Mood as weather
- If you had to describe your emotional state as the weather, how is the weather in your project or your tasks at the moment?
How is the weather in relation to your employer, your personal life and your private life?
