MMayaScrum Master · 2 teams · 6 years Example profile The situation Our retros had gone quiet. The same two people spoke, and everyone else waited for me to fill the silence. Experiment she triedDone · 2 sprints Wait ten seconds before speaking. Then ask one question: “What’s not being said?” What happened The first pause felt endless. In the second retro, a developer named the release stress nobody had mentioned, and the team chose its own action for the first time. Growth areas Letting the team own its conflicts9 reflections · 5 experiments Holding silence6 reflections · 3 experiments What she learned When I fill the silence, I take the thinking away from the team. Next experimentLet the team run the first half of the retro themselves.
Shared anonymously · Scrum Master · logisticsExample Situation “My Product Owner keeps bypassing the team.” What I tried I stopped solving it for them and brought the PO and developers together with one question: what do you need from each other? What happened Uncomfortable at first. A week later, the PO brought the team an open question instead of a finished solution. What I learned I realised I was taking too much ownership of the team’s conflict.
Another Scrum Master · SaaS, 3 teams “I’ve experienced something similar.” My PO wasn’t doing it on purpose. He didn’t know how to bring uncertainty to the team, so I asked him to bring one open question to refinement. Sometimes “bypassing” is a skill gap, not a power move.