This article is a review of “Mastering Professional Scrum” by Stephanie Ockerman & Simon Reindl.
In a variety of Scrum literature, I encountered the ‘Shu-Ha-Ri’ concept, which describes the stages of learning to mastery. Originating from Japanese Aikido, it can be roughly translated to “follow the rule, break the rule and transcend the rule”. In the case of the mastery of the role of Scrum Master, the book ‘Mastering Professional Scrum’ by Stephanie Ockerman and Simon Reindl falls in the second category, helping Scrum Masters to achieve their ‘Ha’ stage.
The book moves past a description of Scrum framework and going ‘through the motions’ (basically what the Scrum Guide does), and instead helps to learn the underlying principles and theory behind the framework. The book poses a lot of “why” questions. For experienced Scrum Masters hungry to expand and grow their skills, this book provides great practical insights, such as tools or sets of questions to apply to processes and problems. The ‘In Practice’ sections in the book provide with many of these insights and deserve a thorough readthrough!
I recommend having advanced knowledge of Scrum before reading this book. Having good understanding and basic experience in applying the framework helps a lot with building a mental model, which you can expand upon when reading ‘Mastering Professional Scrum’. Though very useful for Scrum Masters, experienced Product Owners, Developers and Agile Leaders might pick up great new things to learn as well – so basically the book is for all Scrum practitioners with a working knowledge of Scrum and a healthy ambition for improvement. The language in the book is easy to understand and the book is well structured on topics.
My opinion is that this book is great to revisit when encountering specific situations or problems, so it’s can be seen as a typical reference book. Although, it is possible to read the chapters sequential and read it from cover to cover (as I did).
Conclusion: A great read for advanced Scrum Masters (and other Scrum practitioners) looking for advanced knowledge, useful tools and ‘handles’. ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 1/2