City of Austin - JOB DESCRIPTION

IT Scrum Master Senior

IT Scrum Master Seniors facilitate and champion the agile software development process by coaching and mentoring development teams, identifying and eliminating impediments, and promoting the use of standards and best practices. Ensuring smooth operation of agile processes and activities is critical and this position is responsible for leading the teams through development, leading daily stand-ups, backlog prioritization meetings, and retrospectives all in support of achieving organizational strategies.

1. Works with multiple stakeholder groups and technical teams to define/refine scope, ensuring initiative work is aligned with stakeholder outcomes.
2. Facilitates cross-initiative or cross-team planning discussions and identifies dependencies.
3. Works across agile teams to manage and/or coordinate dependencies.
4. Partners with sponsor(s) and key stakeholders to communicate project goals, objectives, and outcomes.
5. Maintains feedback loop with key stakeholders to ensure identified program adjustments deliver increased business value.
6. Leverages business and technical knowledge related to program initiatives to drive increased business value and emerge as a trusted partner.
7. Drives execution of the backlog, provides feedback for sprint planning, and identifies any potential prerequisites.
8. Establishes a framework or guidelines for the use of contractors and professional service providers and determines their use across initiatives.
9. Addresses resource gaps as necessary, proactively escalating and resolving concerns.
10. Works with Service and Product Managers to develop release plans, roadmaps and backlogs.
11. Proposes level of initiative documentation and definition of “done” and facilitates agreement across stakeholders.
12. Organizes and facilitates scrum ceremonies.
13. Works with Service/Product Managers to update backlog estimates based on teams’ performance & stakeholder priority.
14. Ensures the inclusion and effectiveness of Organizational Change Management activities and may coordinate change efforts across initiatives.

May provide leadership, work assignments, evaluation, training, and guidance to others.

• Knowledge of product life cycle, including software development methodologies, design, and implementation.
• Knowledge of Scrum, Lean, XP, Kanban, and other Agile development techniques.
• Knowledge of test automation concepts and methods.
• Knowledge of agile principals across project management, scrum, product management, etc.
• Knowledge of the organization’s mission, values, operations, and goals.
• Knowledge of data and integration architectures to manage, transform, and exploit data across the enterprise.
• Knowledge of the principles and methods to identify, analyze, specify, design, and manage functional and infrastructure requirements.
• Skill in leading facilitation, test driven development, quality assurance, release and deployment management, reporting, and agile estimation and planning.
• Skill in scrum and leading process improvement.
• Ability to be self-motivated and work independently and perform multiple tasks under minimal supervision.
• Ability to train, coach and mentor the team.
• Ability to resolve conflicts by facilitating discussion and providing alternatives or different approaches.
• Ability to continuously improve by learning new tools and techniques and finding new ways to accomplish work activities and objectives.
• Ability to connect and influence others to achieve team goals.
• Ability to innovate by experimenting, accepting constructive feedback, adapting, and evolving.
• Ability to achieve broadly communicated objectives with a minimal amount of supervision.
• Ability to adhere to required compliance to all change management policies and procedures.
• Ability to adhere to required compliance to all information security policies and procedures.

• Graduation with a Bachelor’s degree from an accredited college or university with major course work in a field related to the job, plus six (6) years of experience in a related field
• Experience may substitute for education for up to 4 years
• Master's Degree in a related field may substitute for two (2) years of experience

Scrum Master certification required.