ken-schwaber resigned from the scrum-alliance in October 2009 (approximate month), citing irreconcilable disagreement over the direction of Scrum certification and education. He subsequently founded scrum-org as a competing organization with a more rigorous certification approach.
The disagreement
The stated reasons for ken-schwaber's departure included:
1. Certification rigor: The Scrum Alliance's Certified Scrum Master (CSM) required only two days of training and no examination. ken-schwaber believed this produced too many nominally certified practitioners who lacked real understanding of scrum.
2. Assessments: ken-schwaber wanted to introduce assessment components to certification programs. The Scrum Alliance's business model — dependent on volume of CSMs issued through training partners — created institutional resistance to harder certification requirements.
3. Developer program: Disputes over programs for independent trainers and the commercial structure of the Scrum Alliance's trainer certification.
Scrum.org
ken-schwaber founded scrum-org in 2009. The key innovation was the Professional Scrum Master (PSM) certification structure:
The two organizations now co-exist and maintain separate certification programs, both referencing the scrum-guide (which ken-schwaber and jeff-sutherland continue to update jointly and publish separately from both organizations).
Significance
This schism is a case study in the agile-industrial-complex dynamic: the commercialization of Agile certification created organizational incentives at the Scrum Alliance that its co-founder considered incompatible with genuine quality. The departure did not significantly slow Scrum adoption — both organizations grew — but it created a permanent split in the Scrum community's institutional structure.
The event also illustrates a recurring pattern in Agile movement history: the tension between the founders' vision of what a framework means and the commercial ecosystem that grows up around it.