“When you want to make things work, you need to find a way to carry people along. Lead, not by forcing your way on the team, because you’re working with smart people, you’re working with professionals.” – Olaitan Fashanu
When Olaitan transitioned from project management into the Scrum Master role, he carried his old habits with him: enforce, push, drive. Then he walked into a team of senior developers. In one retrospective, a team member casually suggested that someone could help set up Jira properly. Olaitan took it personally—wasn’t that his job?
The next day in the daily standup, he called it out publicly. The reaction told him everything. The team member shut down. The PO pulled him aside afterward to say, “We could have had a better discussion around this.”
That moment, Olaitan realized that having no formal authority isn’t a weakness to compensate for with force—it’s the whole point. The job is to influence, to nudge, to coach—even when the conversations are hard. Especially when they are hard.
Self-reflection Question: When was the last time you raised a difficult topic in a way that closed the conversation instead of opening it—and what would it have cost you to bring it up differently?
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About Olaitan Fashanu
Olaitan Fashanu is a customer-focused professional with expertise in product management, technology, and coaching. He drives digital and agile transformation, builds collaborative cross-functional teams, and delivers high-quality products across markets. Curious and strategic, he explores AI and data intelligence while balancing technical depth, business goals, culture, structure, and long-term vision.
You can link with Olaitan Fashanu on LinkedIn.
