Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast: "When To Stop Helping Agile Teams To Change—A Real Life Story" | Tom Molenaar

Date: September 29, 2025
Host: Vasco Duarte
Guest: Tom Molenaar, Team Coach, former Social Psychology and Behavioral Influence student

Episode Overview

In this "Fail Monday" episode, host Vasco Duarte is joined by Tom Molenaar, a team coach from the Netherlands with a background in social psychology and behavioral influence. Tom shares a candid story of his early failure as a Scrum Master–centering on when and why it’s necessary to stop pushing teams to change, especially when the drive for change isn’t coming from within the team. The conversation delves into the importance of recognizing limits to one’s influence, the emotional labor of coaching reluctant teams, and the boundaries of the Scrum Master’s responsibility.

Tom’s Journey to Scrum Mastery

[01:24–04:31]

• Background: Tom entered the Scrum Master world from a research/people-focused angle, not the technical side.
  • "I studied social psychology and when I was doing my master in behavioral influence... I approached this consultancy agency in Amsterdam because I needed an internship to link my practical insights to a real life situation." — Tom [01:51]
• Discovering Agile: His internship focused on researching the connection between job happiness and agile ways of working.
  • Interesting finding: No direct correlation between working Agile and job happiness, but a strong link was found between job happiness and autonomy/challenge.
• First Steps: Tom was offered a job and traineeship with the consultancy, blending insight, empathy, and strategy, despite little technical background.

The Failure Story: Trying Too Hard to Change an Unwilling Team

[05:42–14:34]

Initial Context

[05:42–07:56]

• Tom joined a new data science team as an external Scrum Master. Their manager wanted improvement, but team members saw no urgency.
  • "From the point that I started joining their team, I felt that they didn't... feel the urgency to invest in improving their way of working or improving their team effectiveness." — Tom [05:42]

The Resistance

[07:56–10:38]

• Disengagement: The team complied superficially due to management pressure, but internal buy-in was absent; some team dynamics even started to turn toxic.
  • "There was a silent agreement because... their manager saw the benefit and I was hired as an external SCRUM master to guide that process. So they first, they went along because their manager wanted to, but I did feel that internally they were just very much in resistance." — Tom [07:56]
• Feeling Overlooked: As the product lead/PO got busy elsewhere, the team felt abandoned, exacerbating their resistance to change.
• Brown Paper Silence: Tom recalls running a session on process waste, only to be met by complete silence.
  • "No one spoke up. Like, no one, actually, no one. So I started filling it in because I was like, also a bit at that time afraid to sink in that uncomfortable feeling of, okay, nothing is happening here, guys, what does that mean?" — Tom [09:27]
• Emotional Toll: Persisting in the face of team disengagement left Tom exhausted.

The Turning Point: Recognizing Limits

[10:38–14:09]

• Self-Doubt and Pushing Harder: At first, Tom blamed his inexperience and tried even harder to engage the team.
• Support System: Having a manager/mentor to discuss these struggles was vital. They concluded that despite small process changes (e.g., moving from Sprints to Kanban to fit the team's flow), psychological resistance was too deep.
• Realization: “This is not mine to carry.” Tom had to accept that sometimes, the Scrum Master cannot 'save' the team.

Key Lessons & Insights

When to Stop

• "Sometimes there isn't a way out, we need to get out so that things can take their own direction." — Vasco [12:44]
• "At the point when we feel exhausted... we're bringing passion and motivation and enthusiasm and all of that is just flying over the team, the team isn’t grabbing to any of that... at that point, it's really great to have a partner... But... sometimes that's it, that's the end of the line and there's nothing we can do. And that's okay because we're not supposed to succeed 100% of the time. Nobody is." — Vasco [12:44]

The Scrum Master's Responsibility

• "When the team doesn't feel the urgency and doesn't want to move, it's not my job to save a team. And that's like not my job to save the team." — Tom [13:40]
  • Vasco responds: "I think that's a T-shirt right there." [14:09]
• The importance of honest conversations, but also knowing when to let go.

Systemic Causes

• Underlying issues (e.g., team feeling abandoned) often block improvement efforts more than process tweaks ever could.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On entering the Scrum Master role:
  "You really came from the people side. A lot of the people we interview here on the podcast, they come from the technical side or project management side, but you came from the people side, of course, because this is also very much a people business." — Vasco [05:06]

• On facilitating when no one participates:
  "No one spoke up. Like, no one, actually, no one. So I started filling it in because I was... afraid to sink in that uncomfortable feeling of, okay, nothing is happening here, guys, what does that mean?" — Tom [09:27]

• On letting go:
  "It's not my job to save a team." — Tom [13:40]
  "I think that's a T-shirt right there." — Vasco [14:09]

• On systemic flaws:
  "They didn't feel the urgency. Their manager wanted them to become better. They felt a bit abandoned. I was trying to coach them in the best ways possible." — Tom [14:11]

Timeline of Key Segments

| Timestamp | Segment | |-------------|-----------------------------------------------------------------------| | 01:24–04:31 | Tom’s personal journey to Agile/Scrum, entering from social sciences | | 05:42–07:56 | Failure setup: Taking on a disengaged team | | 07:56–10:38 | Describing the resistance and emotional toll | | 10:38–12:44 | Realizing exhaustion and getting mentor support | | 12:44–14:34 | Accepting limits, the importance of letting go |

Summary Takeaways

• Scrum Masters must recognize when team change can’t be forced and that reactivity to disengagement often only exhausts the coach.
• Systemic issues (like abandonment or lack of psychological safety) should be addressed before expecting progress.
• Open discussion with managers or peers about disappointment and exhaustion is crucial for personal and professional development.
• It’s not the Scrum Master’s job to 'save' teams that aren’t ready—progress is co-created, not imposed.

This episode provides a nuanced, honest look into Scrum Master challenges, especially for those new to the field, and validates the emotional complexity inherent in coaching teams resistant to change.