9 min read
Updated
What Is a Certified ScrumMaster (CSM) Class Like? A Four-Session Look
What happens in a Certified ScrumMaster (CSM) class with Michael Vizdos: four sessions, a printed workbook, role play and simulations, online or in person.
A Certified ScrumMaster (CSM) class with me is four sessions of doing, not listening. You play a role, run a short Sprint, write a Product Backlog and argue about what “Done” means, with a workbook you are asked to write in. There are no PowerPoint slides. It runs online or in person, and the same agenda applies either way.
The short version:
- The class has four sessions. Over two days, that is two sessions a day. Over four half days (about four hours each), it is one session per day.
- It is hands-on. You role-play, simulate a Sprint, run a retrospective and write user stories. No code.
- You get a workbook. Online, it is a PDF sent ahead of time, and I suggest printing it. In person, it is printed and waiting at your seat.
- Do the pre-work first: Scrum Fundamentals and the 2020 Scrum Guide in the Interactive Scrum Guide.
- After the class you register with the Scrum Alliance, take an online assessment, and receive a two-year membership, which is included in the cost.
- Dates and prices live on my training page, so this page never goes stale.
I’m Michael Vizdos, a Certified Scrum Trainer® (CST) since 2006, one of the first 25 in the world, and I have trained 4,900+ Scrum Masters and Product Owners from about 1,500 organizations. My Certified ScrumMaster license is #72, one of the first 75 ever issued (my Scrum Alliance profile).
Who is this class for?
People who want the Scrum Alliance’s ScrumMaster certification, and anyone on or around a Scrum Team: Scrum Masters, Product Owners, Developers, stakeholders, managers, project sponsors and executives. More and more attendees come from outside IT: marketing, sales, operations, legal, construction, teachers and district administrators. Scrum is about people.
It is not for someone who only wants a certification stamp, or who plans to do other work during class. The class is about shifting your mindset, and the other people in the room are part of how that happens.
How do I prepare?
You get the preparation materials by e-mail beginning about a week before. The two things to do:
- Take Scrum Fundamentals.
- Read, listen to or watch the 2020 Scrum Guide in the Interactive Scrum Guide. It works the same whether your class is online or in person.
What is the workbook?
The workbook is your main take-away from the class. It is a printed set of pages with room for your own notes, drawings and doodles, and I ask you to write in it. Fill-in-the-blank pages (the Agile Manifesto, a Scrum diagram you draw yourself) are built to be completed during the session.
Three small things people remember:
- The name card. One page is meant to be torn out on the first morning and folded into a tent. It asks for your name, your Scrum experience and your passion outside of work, so your table has something to talk about besides Scrum.
- The reflections page. A “My Reflections & Key Learnings” page you keep through the class, where I ask you to write down what you are learning as we go.
- The book reference page. A page for the class’s reading list, where anyone who wants to share a book or an idea puts a post-it on the wall. It also points to the 1986 Harvard Business Review article The New New Product Development Game, the Scrum Guide audio book and Interactive Scrum Guide, and the changes between the 2017 and 2020 Scrum Guides (the page asks you to be able to describe three of them). For an advanced read about real-world “aha” moments, it points to Reinventing Organizations.
What happens in each session?
The agenda is the same every time. The experience is not: it depends on the group and on each person in the room. I can change what we do and when, depending on the people.
Session 1: Agile, Scrum basics and meeting “Stan”
- What’s in it for me? We start by writing your expectations for the class on the workbook’s opening page, so we can check them before you leave.
- The Agile Manifesto and why it exists, with the 12 principles revisited before we leave.
- Organizational impediments to agility, “Shu-Ha-Ri” (why a ScrumMaster’s context matters) and how waterfall differs from agile.
- Role play: “Meet Stan.” A senior leader who asks pointed questions, and a hard test of how you respond. See why leaders like Stan ask what they ask, and these two short podcast episodes: how a Scrum Master prepares for an executive stakeholder conversation and an executive’s view of a failing project.
- A discussion of when Scrum fits, using a diagram known as the Stacey matrix.
- Exercise: Scrum in under ten minutes. You draw the whole framework on one page: the Scrum Team, events, artifacts and values.
- Table talks. Small groups answer the questions people actually ask: What is a Sprint Goal versus a Product Goal? How long should a Daily Scrum be? What is an Increment? Who is responsible for estimates?
Session 2: Use Scrum to learn Scrum
- Simulation. Your table picks a Product Owner and a Scrum Master, orders a Product Backlog (a fictional tourism product for Mars), holds a Sprint Planning, runs two short days of a Sprint with a Daily Scrum, and ends with a Sprint Review done as a short infomercial.
- Retrospective. The Sprint Retrospective in five steps (set the stage, gather data, generate insights, decide what to do, close), and the Retrospective Prime Directive.
- The ScrumMaster accountability. Leader versus facilitator, Scrum Master versus project manager, and servant leadership. Your homework is to research servant leadership and learn how facilitating, teaching, mentoring and coaching are different.
- The Developer accountability. What a self-managing, cross-functional team looks like, and the Tuckman stages: forming, storming, norming and performing.
Session 3: Values, the Product Owner and “Done”
- We start with overnight questions and the homework.
- The Scrum Values (Focus, Openness, Respect, Commitment, Courage) and why living them is a mindset shift. The 12 Agile principles, revisited.
- The Product Owner accountability: vision, the “why” behind the product, and why a great Product Owner can say “no.”
- The Definition of Done: who your real customer is, the difference between a customer and an end user, and what makes work part of an Increment. Plus a pro tip on starting a project with Scrum.
Session 4: Stories, estimates and what you do next
- User stories and personas, with acceptance criteria. Then a story-writing workshop where your table builds a Product Backlog for a (fictional) online service.
- The 80/20 rule (the Pareto principle) for stocking and refining a backlog. In the CSPO class we go much deeper on ordering by value; see Private CSPO Class for Your Team.
- Agile estimation and planning: points, velocity, burn-down charts and the #NoEstimates idea, and Sprint and Release Planning. Estimates are not promises, and we change that conversation. Burn-downs have proven useful, but they do not replace empiricism, and we discuss why.
- Bonus topics: technical debt, iterative versus incremental (explained with a famous painting being built in pieces versus sketched and refined), how to prioritize between projects so work finishes in order instead of everything starting at once, why multi-tasking slows everyone down, and “What next?”
Before we finish, we go back to the expectations from the first morning and see which ones we met. I also ask for your feedback on the class. Then comes the last workbook exercise: write down one idea from the class that you will use in real life, and how you will stay accountable for it. You should leave with something you can put in place the next working day.
What do people write down?
These are representative reflections from recent attendees, unattributed:
- “Perfection is not the goal.”
- “Don’t wait for permission.”
- “If the team fails, let them fail and learn from it.”
- “‘No’ is a complete sentence.”
- “Newfound respect for Product Owners.” (The Product Owner side gets its own class: CSPO.)
What is different online and in person?
The agenda is the same. The room is not.
- Online: Zoom, including its built-in whiteboards. The workbook comes as a PDF ahead of time, and I suggest printing it so you can write in it.
- In person: a printed workbook, small tables of teammates, many hands-on “toys” (playdough, fuzzy sticks), big easel sheets, post-its, a whiteboard, catering and a lot of candy and snacks.
If the class is over two days, expect Sessions 1 and 2 on day one and Sessions 3 and 4 on day two. If it is four half days, you get one session each day, which is easier on calendars.
What if I want a private class, or my leaders involved?
Everything above is also true of my private classes. A private class does not change the content. It changes who is in the room, and it makes it easier to get cover from above.
The same two extras are available with a public seat if you ask: a call with your leaders before the class, and a follow-up a few hours long with the leaders and the cohort afterward. If you are sending several people, or your leaders’ support is the part you are unsure about, ask for them. A class cannot change what the team goes back to. Cover from an executive afterward is what turns a toolbox into a changed way of working. For how that works, see Private CSPO Class for Your Team: Online or On-Site?. The CSM version works the same way.
What happens after the class?
You get what you need to register with the Scrum Alliance and take an online assessment. Don’t worry about a perfect score. Based on the results from my international attendees, it should not be hard to finish.
Once you pass, you are a Certified ScrumMaster with a two-year Scrum Alliance membership. The initial membership fee is included in the cost of the class, and I take care of processing it. If you need PDUs for the PMI or other continuing education, we make sure they are applied (usually good for up to 16 PDUs).
What does a CSM class include?
- Four sessions with a Certified Scrum Trainer, over two days or four half days, online or in person.
- The workbook (a PDF ahead of time online, printed in person).
- The Certified ScrumMaster certification through the Scrum Alliance, plus a two-year membership.
- Up to 16 PDUs, if you need them.
- A pre-call and a follow-up with your leaders, on request.
Current pricing and dates are on my training page.
What next?
Questions, or want to talk before you register? Contact me. You will reach me, not a sales team, and if I am not the right fit, I will say so.
- See upcoming and private classes: training
- Your team needs the Product Owner side too: Private CSPO Class for Your Team
- Leadership or the system is the problem: executive advisory
- It is about you as a leader: 1:1 mentoring
Who wrote this?
I’m Michael Vizdos. I started in software delivery at EDS in 1991, so I have 35+ years in this work. I’m the creator of Implementing Scrum and co-author, with Scott Ambler, of The Enterprise Unified Process (2005). I have been a Certified Scrum Trainer® since 2006. More about my background.
We are committed to an environment that fosters dignity and respect for all participants. During each event, participants keep communications professional and supportive of the learning environment, and I reserve the right to remove anyone whose actions disrupt it.
Weekly, free, no fluff
Get one actionable Scrum idea a week.
Saturday morning emails on Implementing Scrum in the real world — the same cartoons and straight talk that built this site.
Subscribe — It's FreeStuck on something specific? Email me your situation.
