Leadership within the Development Team?

Scrum does not recognize many other things, like the role of CEO or VP R&D for example, but it doesn't mean they should or should not exist :)

The leader role within the team is intentionally left open since it pretty much depends on the team, the organization and a bunch of other factors.

More often than not, a team member will assume some more responsibilities becoming a de-facto team leader. The important distinction is to not confuse it with the traditional team leader role, where a TL is supposed to delegate tasks to team members and to orchestrate everything.

It would be wiser, in my opinion, not to appoint an official team leader for the team but to let this unfold naturally, while still allowing the team to self-organize.

Boris hit it pretty good. While organic initiative and leadership are encouraged, it's also important that the rest of the Dev Team doesn't almost always defer to a certain person for a particular kind of leadership. Use the Scrum Rugby team metaphor -- the ball is passed back and forth often, it's not the same person always carrying the ball.

The problem comes when people treat someone as if they are an authority figure on the team, thus harming the team's ability to self organize, or allowing the rest of the Dev Team to slink away from their responsibility to help self organize the team.

As long as said leadership moves from time to time from person to person, chances are that self organization is thriving.

Great perspectives.

I'll add to what @Brett said by pointing out that the person(s) functioning in a leadership capacity (not role) must realize the best leadership is at times, letting things fail. For example, a "lead" developer taking a much needed 2-week vacation or a Scrum Master doing the same, may expect certain things to fall down and go BOOM. So long as the cost of this failure is acceptable, the ROI can be immense. Those who never step up will rise to the occasion to fill a vacuum no one new they could fill. In my experience, this hugely improves not only a team's capacity to self-organize, but also how much they like working together :).

> I would help with scheduling talks among dev.
> team members, assist some, coach some, get
> some to work together, etc.

What was your Scrum Master doing while you were serving and leading in this way?

I would add that while certain roles and responsibilities evolve within a team as they self-organize, the sharing of these responsibilities within the team should be highly encouraged.

It looks like that you are playing the role of Scrum Master, be cautious that team should not start looking at you for everything.