Scrum Master Certification

I receive more questions about Agile certification than perhaps any other topic. For a Certified Scrum Master (CSM) certification you can find a listing of trainers and courses at The Scrum Alliance (www.scrumalliance.org). To be granted the CSM mark you must take the CSM assessment and correctly answer 37 of the 50 questions on that assessment. The CSM assessment can be taken on-line with an instructor, or you can attend a face to face two-day instructor-led offering. The cost for the two-day CSM session varies quite a bit, ranging from $445US to around $2,000US. The Scrum Alliance also offers an Advanced Certified Scrum Master (A-CSM) certification for persons who have a solid background in the Scrum Master role.

Alternately, you can consider the Professional Scrum Master (PSM) certification offered by Scrum.org  (www.scrum.org). The PSM comes in three offerings of successively more-demanding levels (Level 1, Level 2, and Level 3). Each offering requires taking an assessment and the student must achieve a minimum score. Many aspiring Scrum Masters gravitate to the PSM offerings because they are very affordable. The PSM 1 certification is a self-study model and costs only $200 to take the on-line exam. PSM 2 and PSM 3 are also self-study models. The PSM exam costs $250, and the PSM 3 exam costs $500. Unsurprisingly, most candidates never go beyond the relatively easy PSM 1 level. In early 2024 I obtained for my book the following number of certifications awarded by Scrum.org for each PSM Level:

PSM Level 1: 628,705
PSM Level 2: 39,021
PSM Level 3: 1,150 ( less than 2/10ths of one percent of the PSM Level 1 number!)

But are these certifications worth the time and cost? The answer depends on the candidate’s actual Agile experience.

I will offer my personal observations after three decades in Agile, and 19 years as a CSM. The reality is that the CSM and PSM certifications are not regarded very positively if the holder has little or no Agile experience. They are regarded more positively if the holder has at least two to three years of actual Agile project experience. The reason is simple: anyone can sit through a two day course and pass a multiple-choice test. But that experience does not prepare anyone to serve effectively in a Scrum Master role.

Certifications are not regarded very positively if the holder has little or no Agile experience, because passing a test is not a proxy for serving a team.

I am keenly aware that some people like to accumulate certifications, and I will not dissuade anyone from obtaining a CSM or PSM if that is their professional goal. But I do want you to be aware that if you interviewed with me, and had little or no Agile project experience, and you had one of these certifications I would not give it much consideration at all. An inexperienced interviewer would give it weight, but not an experienced Agile person who would expect you to describe in detail the complex nuances of your project experience, the challenges you overcame, how you served your team, where you felt you had to direct them or nurture them, and so forth.

My recommendation for anyone wishing to pursue a Scrum Master role with minimal or no Agile delivery experience is: find an Agile project to align yourself with in any role at all, then shadow the Scrum Master on the project and learn everything you can for a year, or even two. Consider sitting for a certification after getting some miles on your tires, so to speak. Rather than leveraging a certification as a vehicle for learning what a Scrum Master should do, let the certification be a reflection of what you have already learned. You have options, and experience is the very best option.