Scrum Master II

The Scrum Master has primary responsibility of facilitating the learning and growth of one or more Agile teams in developing a lean-Agile mindset, improving practices and guiding them to more predictable delivery.   

The Scrum Master plays a role in facilitating Agile ceremonies and cadences, guiding service delivery orientation, and supporting teams in establishing and managing effective practices related to; visualization, WIP limits, flow management, feedback loops, and continuous improvement. 

The Scrum Master has intermediate knowledge of Agile, Lean, Scrum, and Kanban to help shift the team from ‘Doing Agile’ to ‘Being Agile’. The SM understands the value of managing queue lengths, limiting WIP, recognizes the patterns, and is able to coach the team on these concepts while helping them achieve organizational “Customer-Driven” maturity and resiliency. Those in this role will be skilled in facilitation at the team level as well as in partnership with Engineering, Product, and Operations. 

WHAT YOU'LL DO

Backlog Management Practices 

• Works with Product Managers & Product Owners and team members to learn and practice healthy backlog management and prioritization practices 

• Facilitates the execution and improvement of backlog refinement 

• Prepares for and facilitates release planning with teams 

• Assists in dependency management and cross team coordination 

• Responsible for improving quarterly intent planning and associated processes to develop and drive vision, roadmap, backlog and pre- and post- quarterly intent planning 

• Facilitates periodic synchronization meetings, including delivery teams at the program level 

• Monitors and tracks planning, completion and implementation metrics 

• Provides data and informational updates to help all stakeholders track planning / implementation progress 

• Summarizes team planning objectives, publishing and communicating for visibility and transparency 

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Lean / Agile Ceremony Facilitation 

• Facilitates continuous improvement and the development of a learning culture on teams 

• Facilitates ceremonies, collaboration, communication, and conflict management 

• Teaches new team members Agile-Lean values, principles, methods and frameworks, practices, and process 

• Influences the organization in the removal of organizational impediments and development of healthy Agile practices 

• Mentors Product Owners and team members in agile practices and continuous improvement 

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Delivery Team Support 

• Helps identify and mitigate impediments to the team’s Flow & Service Level Expectations  

• Acts as a buffer between external distractions to minimize disruptions – champions “Stop Starting – Start Finishing” behaviors  

• Assists in the coordination of operational issue resolution 

• Facilitates team development, mediates conflict, and encourages healthy team dynamics. 

• Fosters team responsibility, self-accountability, transparency and self-organization 

• Leverages coaching skills to help the team learn to solve its own problems 

Advice and Guidance 

• Introduces and encourages team to explore healthy Agile development practices, focus on quality and technical excellence, predictable delivery, automation, and continuous delivery 

• Teaches and encourages a balanced backlog that delivers valuable features for customers, reduces technical debt, provides business value, and enables product sustainability 

• Helps the team to develop, capture, and analyze metrics to facilitate team improvements 

• Promotes transparency through healthy communications and data integrity 

Change Management 

• Plans, designs and implements activities to transition the organization and people to the required future state. 

• Identifies and implements change via influence.  

• Utilizes proven methodologies, such as ADKAR, Lewin’s model, McKinsey, etc. to lead and influence team and organizational change management.  

• Demonstrates systems thinking skills in regards to how change will affect their teams and the organizational process, as a whole. 

WHO YOU ARE

Qualifications: 

• Must live in the Atlanta Georgia area and observe a weekly in office hybrid schedule

• Bachelor’s degree and 2-5 years of working experience as a dedicated Scrum Master. 

• Working experience in more than one of the following Lean-Agile methods or frameworks: Kanban, Scrum with Kanban, Scrum, Extreme Programming (XP), Lean applied to Knowledge Work. 

• Working experience with Agile scaling frameworks, preferably SAFe.   

Responsibilities: 

• Coaches the Lean-Agile mindset. 

• Coaches team in Kanban principles and practices. 

• Facilitates continuous improvement.  

• Assists upstream Kanban management and options selection. 

• Helps team manage and improve flow leveraging limiting WIP, risk hedging (classes of service), feedback loop improvements, and establishment of outcome focused policies. 

• Facilitates transparency of metrics, impediment removal, collaboration, and coordination. 

• Facilitates & supports establishment of continuous learning & continuous improvement.   

Desirable: 

• Scrum Master certification or equivalent certified professional (Desired for lower level – required for higher). 

• Kanban Management Professional (KMP) or equivalent and higher. 

• Professional Scrum with Kanban (PSK). 

• SAFe Agilist Certification. 

• Experience and knowledge working with Lean-Kanban product technology and services teams. 

• Kanban or equivalent certification – Kanban Management Professional (KMP) or higher. 

• Professional Scrum with Kanban (PSK).