Dark Scrum Alerts: A continuous series of Dark Scrum warnings. Bringing a little humor to anti-patterns.

Dark Scrum Definition

It looks like Scrum—but it’s just cosplay without the Agile values and principles.
It talks the talk. It even has the sticky notes.
But behind the standups, story points, and “commitments,” something’s missing: trust, collaboration, and purpose.

🔍 Definition:
When you subtract Agile’s values and principles from Scrum, you don’t get process—you get performance theatre.
The result is a maladaptive version of Scrum that causes more harm than good.
Velocity becomes a weapon. Retros become blame sessions. People stop speaking up.

What’s left? A zombie framework—moving, but lifeless.

🧠 Why it matters:
Scrum is meant to empower teams, surface risks early, and deliver real value.
Dark Scrum, on the other hand, often hides dysfunction under a ritual mask—and calls it “accountability.”

#2: Unfinished Work In the Sprint Review

"List what you didn’t finish in the Sprint Review—so stakeholders can shame your team publicly. Shame is motivation fuel!"

#3 Responding to Change by Committee

“Responding to change over following a plan”

Yeah, we respond to change. As long as it's submitted in

writing, approved by three committees, and reviewed at the next change board meeting.

#4 The Scrum Master “causes the removal of impediments”.

Unless the impediment is management. Then they quietly move on.

It’s not servant leadership. It’s self-preservation.

#5 No Customer Collaboration

Every decision is “customer-driven.”

But no one has ever talked to a real customer.

Just internal stakeholders guessing what you should build.

#6 Slack over Face to Face Conversations
Face-to-face

We can’t audit face-to-face conversations are dumb!

All communication must go through Slack !

#7 The Product Owner's Authority

Sure...the Product Owner “owns” the backlog.

Until someone above them overrules them.

POs don’t make decisions but they can update tickets.