Dedicated vs. Rotating Scrum Masters

I spent my first five years as a Scrum Master primarily dedicated to one team. As a result, I got to know team members deeply. Even 10+ years after I left, I’m still in close contact with some of them. Due to frequent changes in the team — people come and go — improving team dynamics was a continuous effort. However, after a while, our team understood Scrum, and I could shift my focus towards the broader organization and our customers.

The following four years were mostly spent as a freelance Scrum Master (or hired via a consultancy agency). Consequently, I worked with dozens of different teams in various organizations. Initially, it was quite stressful, but after a while, I learned how to quickly ‘read the situation,’ become part of the team, and, from the start, prepare the team to succeed with Scrum without me.

Both types of experiences (dedicated & rotating) were tremendously valuable. I wouldn’t have wanted to miss either of them. What I treasure the most from working with many different teams is how I learned to quickly assess what’s going on, spot patterns, and offer experiments I’ve seen work successfully in other contexts.

I see many Scrum Masters who work permanently for one organization and have been on the same team for a long time. In certain domains, teams are stable, so they work with the same team members for years. Combining the role with another specific skill set needed for this team limits flexibility.

Given these insights, I wonder:

Could organizations benefit from a more flexible approach to Scrum Masters? An interesting experiment could be to work without dedicated Scrum Masters and instead create a flexible pool of Scrum Masters.

To make this work, potential work agreements could be:

✅ Scrum Masters only work for one year with the same team.
✅ New teams always have a Scrum Master. If the team is relatively stable, they decide after a year whether to continue with a Scrum Master or self-manage with occasional guidance.
✅ Scrum Masters rotate across different types of teams and domains. In larger organizations, there are plenty of opportunities for this.
✅ If Scrum Masters aren’t assigned full-time to one team, they coach the broader organization and stakeholders. This allows them to fulfill the role as intended.

Of course, for some Scrum Masters, this would be totally out of their comfort zone. But isn’t that where the real learning happens? There are always reasons why this wouldn’t work, but are those valid concerns — or opportunities to rethink how we enable agility?

What is your experience with this? I’d love to hear your thoughts and ideas!
What (other) work agreements do you consider essential to make this work?