Scrum Master certification - worth it?

October 4, 2016 11:24 AM

Someone recently told me I should look into scrum master certification, and I can't for the life of me figure out if it's a good or horrendously bad idea. Advice welcome!

I've been looking to transition out of my field (digital content & marketing), and a friend who works with Agile suggested I would be a good scrum master. I'd never heard of a scrum master before, but the description does seem right up my alley.

A little about my background: I work in digital / editorial, and have done a fair amount of project management, although I don't have a PMP certification or a job title to that effect. I like organizing people and projects, creating deadlines, and making sure people stick to them. I have a strong technical background, although I am by no means a developer. I have startup experience.

But here's what concerns me: Certification is expensive (at least $1,000). And I don't have on-site experience or experience in Agile, so if I actually paid for the certification, I might still be stuck.

Is it actually possible to get a job with just the certification and a background in a similar but not at all identical subject? What am I overlooking here?

posted by good day merlock to Work & Money (13 answers total)

I look at it more like self-advancement? Scrum is an interesting process, it's useful in technology planning and execution from what I've experienced.

That said when I interview people their certs mean less to me than their desire to grow and learn. So if someone has a bunch of certs and then grew from that point of getting the cert, then that carries a hell of a lot more weight than someone who has a cert that they haven't yet tried to apply the knowledge in some way.

I would recommend getting the cert, learning as much as you can about scrum and then applying what you have learned to your projects in any way you can that shows you trying to understand more about the applied aspects of scrum planning.
posted by Annika Cicada at 11:32 AM on October 4, 2016 [1 favorite]

I think you're right that the cert with no experience carries no real weight.

So get experience! Read a few books on Scrum, then apply it in your current job (maybe using tools like JIRA to manage your current workload). Then get your current work to sponsor you to get the cert.

I actually think this is a key career development strategy -- figure out how to apply a new skill in your current job, then move to a new job where that skill is actually part of the expected work. It's tricky to do in real life though.
posted by miyabo at 11:36 AM on October 4, 2016 [3 favorites]

i went through this training and what became apparent was that scrum is really only applicable to larger organizations than i was willing to work for. ymmv.
posted by lescour at 12:34 PM on October 4, 2016 [4 favorites]

In my experience being a Scrum Master is not a job, it's more of a responsibility that is assigned either to managers/PMs or to promising junior folks who want to grow their careers in that direction. I'm sure there are places that hire people to be Scrum Masters (there are places that hire people to do all kinds of crazy things) but IME the actual job title is something like Product Manager, Project Manager, or Engineering Manager, and Scrum Master is a slight plus on the application. You'd still need all the other qualifications for the job in order to be considered; Scrum Master experience wouldn't be enough, and certification without experience would in most cases be useless.
posted by phoenixy at 12:53 PM on October 4, 2016 [3 favorites]

It's a useful certification in a large org that practices Scrum and would want their Scrum Masters to acquire the certification. It's not really a value add to a resume for hiring though.
posted by so fucking future at 12:56 PM on October 4, 2016 [1 favorite]

I don't think the certification would help you get a job as a scrum master. The people I know that transitioned from non-technical roles to scrum master positions did so as internal hires where they were a known quantity that made management willing to give them a shot at managing developers. You can learn about the techniques online/through books - save your money until there's a position that really wants you to have the cert specifically.
posted by Candleman at 1:24 PM on October 4, 2016

You may want to consider getting the PMP certification instead. In my experience it is more transferable to a broader range of jobs.
posted by chevyvan at 1:49 PM on October 4, 2016 [5 favorites]

You say you like organizing people and projects. If you were gonna get a certification, I'd get the PMP, and skip the Scrum master. You probably really want to be a project manager, or in Scrum parlance, a Product Owner. The Scrum master role is really limited to setting up meetings, keeping the team focused on the agenda at said meetings, and not much else.
posted by spudsilo at 3:46 PM on October 4, 2016

I've know a few people who got this. Not sure what they learned as their behaviors and methods never changed.
posted by 922257033c4a0f3cecdbd819a46d626999d1af4a at 4:21 PM on October 4, 2016 [1 favorite]

I have this certification. A previous employer paid for it because they wanted everyone doing Scrum-style development to have formal Scrum training, but IMO the course was low in value and I would not recommend that anyone pay for it out of pocket. I don't keep the cert up-to-date and have never had a prospective employer ask about it. Since you don't have experience in software project management or as a software developer, Scrum Master certification is unlikely to open up new opportunities by itself.
posted by 4rtemis at 4:27 PM on October 4, 2016 [2 favorites]

We use agile. We either home-grow scrum masters or hire people with experience. The credential isn't worthless, but it also will not get someone into our interview set without relevant experience.

If you had a job that would pay for the credential, then maybe. If it's a grand out of pocket, then I think you should pass.
posted by 26.2 at 5:49 PM on October 4, 2016

Nthing that a scrum master certification alone will not get you a job as a product manager. The backgrounds of people I've seen who successfully transitioned to that role were either:
a) founders of small startups that showed they could get stuff shipped, or
b) tech team members who moved sideways from an individual contributor role (design/data/engineering)

Occasionally, I see associate product manager roles, or project management roles, which are meant to be entry-level roles that grow into product roles. If you already have experience getting stuff shipped, emphasizing this in your resume/interview will be enough to get your foot in the door. If not, than a certificate isn't going to help much.
posted by tinymegalo at 6:32 PM on October 4, 2016

I also have this qualification. I'm a fan of Scrum (and agile more widely). I don't feel I learned anything from this course that you wouldn't get from spending an hour reading this. The most I could say is that I did manage to move from a role that would not usually have used Scrum to one that made more use of it later on and it's possible that this qualification sitting on my CV was a point in my favour.

Scrum is an approach more than a didactic process so almost all that I've learned about it has been as a result of practical learning. I'd therefore agree with everything 26.2 says above but add that it's worth having a look around to see if you can find some Agile meetups in your area (if you have startup experience, you probably have some contacts who can help you find these).
posted by unless I'm very much mistaken at 5:47 AM on October 6, 2016