More than a man in a toupe blazer.

I have had a lot on my mind the past two weeks.  My day job is getting more challenging and my home business is puttering along as it always has.  The most exciting thing about working in technology is the pace of change.  If you don’t like something, it is bound to change in a week.  This week, I wanted to devote more attention to the fine article in Bloomberg Business Week entitled “What is code?”  For the beginner in technology, it is a fine read, but it does get a few things wrong, and in particular, they get wrong the role of the “scrum master.”

In the first chapter of the rather long article, they describe a “scrum master” as “The Man in the Taupe Blazer.”  According to the article:

“This man makes a third less than you, and his education ended with a B.S. from a large perfectly fine state university.  But he has 500+ connections on Linked In.  That plus sign after the “500” bothers you.  How many more than 500 people does he know? Five? Five thousand?”

In short, a Scrum master is an eccentric person who understands software development along with project management. If a project goes south, they will be able to get on with their lives, while the executive who hires them will be forced into early retirement.  At first glance, this is not an unfair impression.

The article missed that a scrum master is just as invested as the executive who hires him.  One of the first things a scrum master learns is the difference between involvement and commitment.  To be committed is to put your career at risk if you fail.  To be involved, is to be a participant in a project with no repercussions should it fail.  This gets to the classic metaphor about the breakfast shop and pigs and chickens.  In my darker moments, I joke about being a pig because I live on a steady diet of garbage, live in the excrement of other pigs, being treated with contempt by the other farm animals, and, when necessary, butchered for someone else’s breakfast.

I am not far from the truth.  I don’t know how many times I have had a member of my business organization look at me like I am some kind of insect because I am not as cool, professional, good-looking, or credentialed as they are.  I also spend many moments of my day slopping through the mud of my company's bureaucracy and infrastructure to get things done.  I have had people lie to me and get insulted when I point out they are lying.  I also remember the week before Christmas 2008 when I was slaughtered because I made a mistake after 14 hours of non-stop coding.

So to be clear, my executive friends, many of the scrum masters you face, have seen failure firsthand, and they do not wish to experience it again.  They also know that their success depends on the same things that make you a success: getting the project finished on time and on budget.  We are not some empty shell in taupe blazers.  We are just as invested as you are.

We excel because we understand software and the people who write it.  It is not a pretty job, but every skyscraper built requires hundreds of people who understand engineering, construction, and motivating construction workers to get the job done.  The tower may have “Trump” on its marque, but it took an anonymous engineer with decades of experience to make it rise.

Unfortunately, software development is not a construction in the conventional sense.  While buildings are constructed with steel, glass, and concrete, the software is built using languages and systems that often do not play nicely together.  We also have differing levels of training and experience which is not taught in schools but rather learned on the job so asking a developer to do something that seems routine can be a huge suck of time and money.  Also, software developers, the good ones at least, see themselves as artists.  Which means they cannot be led around like construction workers.  They have to be treated like the intelligent professionals they are.  Instead, they are treated like expensive pigs ready to be sacrificed when a project goes wrong.

Yes, I have a taupe blazer.  Instead of a Bachelor of Science, I have earned a Master’s in Management and I have earned numerous credentials in my field to prove to executives that I know what I am doing.  I also have over 17 years of experience writing software and learning how to adapt tonew technologies.  I am your ally.  I am just as invested in the project's success as you are.  Finally, if you give me what I need to succeed, I will.  So please have a little respect for the scrum masters in your life executives; we are the steady hands that make thesoftware work for your business.

Until next time.