Sending scrum meeting invites

Hi Azhar,

Who facilitates scrum events in scrum?

Well, in perfect world they would be omniscient and would just appear when needed... But they are probably not, so I think the invitations do increase chances of creating an environment where productive and meaningful discussions can take place during Scrum meetings.

Therefore, invitations should be sent, as this is how usual organizations work (unless EVERYONE always sits in one room anyway). Who does it? Someone from the Scrum Team.

The Scrum Guide says:

Scrum Teams are self-organizing and cross-functional. Self-organizing teams choose how best to accomplish their work, rather than being directed by others outside the team

What constraints would you say that ought to place upon the organization of meeting invitations, should any be needed?

Ian,

Lets discuss a scenario where there is one PO for 4 teams and there are a lot of meetings every week.

So a better way is to send invites of all the major meetings ( planning, grooming and review ).

But I just want to know who can be the best person to do it?

SM, PO and anyone in the team ?

Scrum Master facilitates the events so SM should inform the attendees as well through invites

>> Scrum Master facilitates the events so SM should inform the attendees as well through invites

FYI - The Scrum Master facilitates only when requested or needed.

And SM should try to make the team self-organised... In my team however it was usually SM sending the invites.

So a better way is to send invites of all the major meetings ( planning, grooming and review ).

That is a way of scheduling it. It is nice if sending invites is a common practice in your company. Nice if people uses it, and nice if it's your best way to make the members posted on dates, using reminders, re-schedules, etc. It is not the only way though, definitely it's not mandatory and shouldn't be the only way to ensure the correct attendees will be there at the designated moment. If we are to be agile, we need to better communicate face to face (or try to :)

But I just want to know who can be the best person to do it?

That really depends on your scrum teams, and they usually self-organize to make sure the scrum events occur. I've seen the PO sending meetings to the rest of the scrum team, adding stakeholders when required, confirming it by phone calls and re-scheduling it (sometimes almost hundred of times). I've seen the PO 'delegating' on the scrum master due to high overhead (That might be your case, since 4 scrum teams presumably working on 4 different products at different sprint cadences might be high overhead for a product owner to schedule everything up). I've also seen the development team sending meeting invitations for themselves, usually including the scrum master and/or the product owner. I've seen no invitation sending at all but the meeting eventually occuring...  

So I guess that as long as the scrum events occur (events are an essential part of inspection/adaptation within the scrum framework) and the correct attendees participate it does not matter who really schedules them and how. Nevertheless, if nobody eventually takes care of it then I find there is a mistake on the scrum master's responsabilities since she is the one who should always keep a close watch on how the scrum process is being developed. 

Dev. Team should always attempting to be as self-organising as possible

SM facilitates

but if the question is really "who should send meeting invites" it sounds to me like there is an issue between the SM and the Dev team as to who completes 'admin' tasks.

Do not forget the SM is a "Serving Leader", and nothing should above or even below the SM to complete in assisting the team.

But I just want to know who can be the best person to do it?

I'll just state the obvious answer here, whoever the team decides is the best person to coordinate the events. 

Dear all,

Thanks a lot for your valuable comment. Its very clear now.

Thanks Juan for your detailed answer.