When answering and discussing this question an new question came to mind, first some context:
The Scrum guide states that the Scrum Master services the organisation with:
- Leading and coaching the organization in its Scrum adoption;
- Planning Scrum implementations within the organization;
From reading this article "the Scrum Master is not an Agile coach". I get the idea that the Scrum Master should only focus on the Scrum Framework and not other Agile practices, principles and values.
I tend to disagree, because I think Scrum covers only the project management part of "being Agile", but (for example) skips the important technical practices that make products Agile.
Organizational Agility is constrained by Technical Agility
In other words, when you are slow in making changes to your product, then it doesn’t matter how you structure your teams, your organization or what framework you adopt, you will be slow to respond to changes.
Can we successfully implement Scrum as a Scrum Master without also being an Agile coach? The Scrum guide states it is "Difficult to master". I think this is because it only handles the process and not the full cycle as Extreme Programming does.
Leading to the following question: Should the Scrum Master also be an Agile coach, or are they the same?