The five values are load-bearing
Commitment, Focus, Openness, Respect and Courage. The Guide states that successful use of Scrum depends on people becoming more proficient in living these five values, and that they give direction to the team's work, actions and behaviour.
Why it is like this
The pillars describe what has to happen; the values describe what makes people willing to let it happen. Transparency requires openness and courage from someone who has to say the Sprint Goal is not going to be met.
Not to be confused with
Motivational decoration, or a culture statement bolted on afterwards. They were added to the Guide deliberately, and the failure modes are concrete: no courage and nobody reports bad news at the Daily Scrum, which removes transparency, which removes the point of inspecting.
In practice
A team that pads estimates so it never misses a Sprint has traded openness for the appearance of commitment, and the empirical loop stops carrying information.
Source: The Scrum Guide, November 2020 (Schwaber & Sutherland) — Scrum Values. Read on .
The Scrum Guide is published by Ken Schwaber and Jeff Sutherland under CC BY-SA 4.0. These cards are independent commentary written in our own words, not a derivative of the Guide's text. ytyk.org is not affiliated with, endorsed by or licensed by Scrum.org, Scrum Alliance or the Guide's authors.
Odd one out Check yourself
Three of these are Scrum Values. Which one is not?
Show the answer
Simplicity
The five are Commitment, Focus, Openness, Respect and Courage. Simplicity is a principle of the Agile Manifesto and an Extreme Programming value — not a Scrum Value.