Scrum Master vs Project Manager: Roles & Key Differences?

When we talk about the IT industry, we often encounter terminologies such as Scrum Master vs Project Manager. These technical terms might confuse you and you get stuck thinking that both are the same and can be used identically. But, it's not true. Both these terms are different and their roles and responsibilities also differ from one another. If they are the same, then why do they have different names? All these questions might confuse you about both these approaches.

There is a constant juggle between the Scrum Master role and the Project manager role who one should contact. Most of you might be struggling to understand what difference both these job roles bring to an organization. This is not just a job role but it is a strategic choice of how each one will benefit your business in the long term.

Who is a Scrum Master?

A development team is known as a scrum which is an iterative production process. This development team is relatively small and the members need to have enough creativity to come up with unique solutions. In this production process, the product owner allocates a task to the scrum, which is divided into smaller chunks, known as sprints.

We can say that this methodology focuses on the active part of the project whereas a sprint consists of iterative development processes with collaboration that address the prevailing lifespan of a project to develop a project using the Scrum methodologies and get the desired results. The Scrum Master makes sure that the team member follows the agile principles and functions accordingly.

Role of a Scrum Master

The role of a Scrum Master is to check whether the members of the development team are working as per the pre-defined practices and ideas or not. The Scrum Master is the leader of agile-oriented product development and facilitates all the processes. They focus on the main and active parts of the project. But make sure you don't get confused between the Scrum Master and Project Manager both these approaches are not the same. Here the Scrum Master is liable for executing and controlling the Scrum framework that allows the team members to communicate well and maximize the delivered value.

In short, we can say that a Scrum Master is basically a servant-leader that cooperates with the entire development team, uses various Scrum processes, and helps you to deliver maximum value to the customer. The role of a Scrum Master includes:

• Coaches the Product Owner, development team, and Stakeholders about Scrum.
• Enables Sprint Events.
• Help people understand the scrum Framework.
• Help your enterprise to find a way to implement Scrum. 

Who is a Project Manager?

A project manager uses his project-management skills and executes the projects while managing the schedules and budget of the project. S(he) uses data to lead product development from scratch to complete the project successfully before it reaches the deadline. A project manager oversees the entire team, identifies project goals at the initial stage, interacts with the stakeholders, and checks whether the project is functioning as per the predetermined functions or not.

There are 10 key zones that a project manager manages which include communication, cost, achievements, quality, scope, resource, guidance, stakeholder, strategies, business, and industry awareness. However, the roles and responsibilities of a Project Manager are not only limited to project management but it is far more than what we expect.

Role of a Project Manager

As the name suggests, a Project Manager is a person who leads the entire team, allocates tasks to team members, and works across various industrial verticals and projects. A project manager plays an essential role when it comes to product design, software development, and marketing which cannot be overlooked.

The roles of a project manager are as follows:

• Help the team members to interact and collaborate effectively.
• Check whether the planning and execution of the project are done correctly and see whether everything is going according to the plan or not.
• Make sure that the timelines for delivery are met.
• Track the team's progress to keep them on track all the time.
• Allocate resources optimally.

Key Takeaway

So that’s it for the post. In closing, we would like to mention that the differences and roles that we discussed here will help you clear all your queries about the Scrum Master and Project Manager. After reading this post, you will have a clear understanding of the main differences between the Scrum Master vs Project Manager. Both these approaches have different roles and set of responsibilities so make sure you don't complicate things.

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