The Scrum Alliance designed the Advanced Certified Scrum Master (A-CSM) course to be the bridge between the Certified Scrum Master (CSM) course and the Certified Scrum Professional Scrum Master (CSP-SM) courses.

To attend the Advanced Certified Scrum Master course, you need at least one years’ experience as a Scrum Master in a working scrum environment.

The thinking is that you need the working experience and context of working in a Scrum environment to fully benefit from attending the Advanced Certified Scrum Master course.

It takes time to become great at anything and you need the time in the field actively practicing your craft to become better at being a practitioner.

So, what are you next steps after attending the Advanced Certified Scrum Master course?

Firstly, it would be to take at least a year to implement the new knowledge, insights, tools, and techniques that you learn in the A-CSM course.

We have a recommended reading list that accompanies the Advanced Certified Scrum Master course, and you would benefit a great deal by moving through that reading list and slowly but surely growing your knowledge, skills and the application of tools and techniques in a working environment.

Some people look at the certification pathway as something to move through as quickly as possible to obtain the certifications, but you will benefit a great deal more by moving slowly through the process and applying the knowledge and insights you learn along the way.

I would recommend that you practice as an Advanced Certified Scrum Master for at least a year before signing up for the Certified Scrum Professional Scrum Master course.

At the more advanced levels, we aren’t simply teaching you in the classes. We are actively validating your skills and capabilities while we are teaching.

The Scrum Alliance want to provide the industry with assurance that you have the necessary skills, knowledge and capabilities to be certified as an Advanced Certified Scrum Master or Certified Scrum Professional Scrum Master, so you need to actively demonstrate that capability in the course.

If you don’t have the necessary experience and expertise, you won’t be certified on the more advanced levels and would be invited back to attend once you do have the necessary skills and experience.

So, take your time.

At the more advanced levels, you are straddling the roles of a Scrum Master practitioner as well as an Agile coach.

People will be looking to you to provide context and coach them through some tough iterations.

You need the experience at the coalface to do that well.

You would also need significant practice with the tools, techniques, and skills you develop on the more advanced courses to create environments in which your team can thrive.

The great thing about the advanced courses is that you can bring the challenges you currently face into the classroom and find answers, tools, and resources that you can action right away.

In fact, much of our feedback from the more advanced courses is that people implement what they have learned in the classroom and receive immediate breakthroughs in their working environment.

The more experience you have and the greater the challenges you face in your working environment, the more rewarding and fulfilling you will find the advanced courses on the Scrum Alliance pathways.

My advice is that you invest at least a year of your time after attending the A-CSM course in growing your capabilities, exposing yourself to opportunities where you can embed the knowledge and learn as you grow through the challenges your working environment presents.

Take the time to read the books we recommend and invest as much effort as you can in actively implementing what you have learned on the course within your day to day practice as a Scrum practitioner.

I’d love to see you on the Certified Scrum Professional Scrum Master a year after you have completed the Advanced Certified Scrum Master course.

Visit our Advanced Certified Scrum Master and Certified Scrum Professional Scrum Master course pages for more information on what they have to offer.

If you like the idea of a mentored and coach-driven approach to your skills development, visit our Agile Coach Academy page.

If you would like to grow your coaching skills, visit our on-demand Introduction to Coaching course page.