Scrum MasterLocation: Raleigh, NC Duration: Contract Rate: DOE US Citizen and Green cards Only. Expert as a hands on scrum master managing 1-2 teams (i.e. they were 100% allocated to the scrum master role) with recent experience in Rally, daily scrum meetings, and managing upstream and downstream dependencies.
Accountable, "manage the work as if they owned the company" philosophy. Proven experience driving agile adoptions; ability to influence without authority. Some experience as an RTE preferred.
Proven/ability to demonstrate leadership in agile transformation above and beyond core job accountabilities. Soft skills: influence without authority; excellent independent working leader. Lead by example, lead by educating and providing concrete examples, and facilitating process improvement.
Proactive thought leader, manages the day to day without issue but looks forward and across other impacted initiatives. Demonstrated growth in career, skill set, leadership responsibilities and influence.Essential Duties:Doing everything possible to ensure delighted customers (core team, leaders, clients)Guiding the team(s) and the organization on how to use Agile/Scrum practices, valuesGuiding the team(s) on how to get the most out of self-organizationGuiding the team(s) on self-organizing to fully realize the potential of Agile/Scrum frameworksAssessing the Scrum Maturity of the team(s) and organization and coaching the team to higher levels of maturity, at a pace that is sustainable and comfortable for the team and organizationRemoving impediments or guiding the team(s) to remove impediments by finding the right personnel to remove the impedimentBuilding a trusting and safe environment where problems can be raised without fear of blame, retribution, or being judged, with an emphasis of healing and problem solvingFacilitating getting the work done without coercion, assigning, or dictating the workFacilitating discussion, decision making, and conflict resolutionAssisting with internal and external communication, improving transparency, and radiating informationSupporting and educating the Product Owner, especially with respect to grooming and maintaining the product backlogProviding all support to the team(s) using a servant leadership style whenever possible, and leading by examplePerform as an evangelist for Optum's internal implementation of SAFe (SAFe + PLM)Helping the department and Optum mature out of legacy processesMentor junior Scrum Masters towards improvementRequired Skills/Experience:First level Scrum Master certification (CSM, PSM I, SAFe Agilest or Practitioner)5 years of experience in a Scrum Master role for a software development team that was diligently applying Scrum principles, practices, and theory.Good skills and knowledge of facilitation, situational awareness, conflict resolution, continual improvement, empowerment, and increasing transparencyKnowledge of numerous well documented patterns and techniques for eliciting change in team behavior (example: numerous Burndown techniques, numerous Retrospective formats, handling bugs, etc.)Preferred Skills/Experience (Any of these is a plus):Second level Scrum Master certification (CSP, PSM II, SPCT 4++)Knowledge of other agile approaches: XP, Kanban, Crystal, FDD, etc.Knowledge and/or experience with widely successful Agile techniques: User Stories, ATDD, TDD, Continuous Integration, Continuous Testing, Pairing, Automated Testing, Agile GamesApplicable knowledge of the technologies used by the team (.Net, Java, or other web development languages)Previous experience as a development team leadExcellent communication and mentoring skillsContributions to the public around agile practices