Tech qualification question

[RoundTable]

For the techies in here, a question about scrum qualifications.

In my job I sometimes act as scrum master, and sometimes as scrum product owner. I’d like to get the certificate to go with my role.

Which one do you think has more professional value? Personally, I think product owner is more aligned to overall business needs, but recruiters and higher managerial hierarchies removed from the technical day-to-day seem to be more in awe of the term ‘scrum master’. They have heard of scrum master but not of scrum product owner.

Doing both is not a financial option at the moment, but I’d like to start with one.

Thoughts?

[alex_b]

I think it depends where you want to take your career. Doing a Scrum Master qualification will take you down that route (and allied PM disciplines) where a Product Owner qualification is more likely to take you in a Product Management direction.

As for businesses recognising Scrum Master more it is probably down to them practicing a Wagile model where they’ve rebadged the PM as a scrum master and don’t have recognisable product ownership or backlog grooming/prioritisation. Some red flags to avoid!

Qualification wise, in addition to the standard Scrum certifications; Leading SAFe is a good one to look at, as is the PMI Agile PM. I’d also push for your work to fund it.