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MERCY GUECH, PHD, PMP, PSM

City: Rockville. State: Maryland 301-***-**** ad2tpi@r.postjobfree.com PROFESSIONAL SUMMARY

Exceptional value-driven Project Manager/Coordinator and Scrum Master/Team Coach with over 10 years of hands-on experience managing and facilitating projects in the healthcare and biomedical research field, using different project management methodologies, from ideation through deployment/completion, within budget and on-time. Adept at working with JIRA/Confluence, ProjectManager.com and working knowledge of other agile project management tools such as Miro and Azure DevOps. A servant leader and agile coach with experience working with both co-located and offshore teams and stakeholders through virtual platforms such as Slack and Teams. Strong ability to lead and coach both new and mature teams by providing strategic direction through innovative facilitating approaches to address team and organizational impediments. Focuses on operational efficiencies while coaching teams throughout agile transformation process from waterfall to agile.

SKILLS

• Excellent Communication Skills

• Facilitator and Coach

• Strong Organizational skills

• Project Management

• Planning and Coordination

• Team Transformation

• Risk Analysis and Mitigation Planning

• Trainer

• MS Office 365

• AGILE Workflow

• Project Management Tool (JIRA)

• Microsoft Project

• Agile Frameworks (Safe, Scrum, Kanban)

• Process and Workflow Improvement

• Conflict Resolution

• Soft Skills, Leadership and Team Building

WORK HISTORY

PROJECT MANAGER / SCRUM MASTER 10/2018 to Present

Guidehouse – Rockville, MD

• Coach teams working on projects related to biological sample data/inventory management and tracking systems for example, Global Trace, Redcap and Freezerworks.

• Support teams on projects to enhance existing features in a new online system, PROTECT, developed for use by multiple teams to conduct scientific review of research study protocols to assess their scientific merit.

• Attend discovery meetings, requirement gatherings and analysis, document-reviews, plan setup, and plan configuration with stakeholders.

• Facilitate scrum ceremonies for multiple teams including Sprint Planning, Daily Standup, Sprint Review and Sprint Retrospective.

• Experience working with other Scrum Masters during Scrum of Scrums to identify inter-team dependencies and process changes to implement effective collaboration.

• Organize trainings and workshops on agile principles and practices, story estimation, planning and effective user story writing.

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• Work with Product Owner on backlog refinement, prioritization and ensuring that tickets meet the definition of ready.

• Track and communicate team velocity and sprint release progress using Jira/Confluence for metrics and required documentation.

• Review velocity, Burn-up and Burn-down charts with teams and ensure that the team is making progress towards the sprint goal.

• Lead, manage and oversee scientific, technical, and operational project tasks and processes.

• Prepare scientific and technical project documents including protocols, work instructions, standard operating procedures, and progress reports.

• Lead, coordinate and/or oversee training on project-related processes.

• Coordinate the scientific review process of project protocols.

• Foster collaboration, continuous improvement, and empowerment of self-organized teams.

• Build a safe and trusting environment of open communication to foster conflict resolution management without the fear of blame.

• On-board new team members by providing the appropriate trainings and coaching needed to fully integrate as part of the agile team.

PROJECT MANAGER / SCRUM MASTER 2016 to 2018

Medical Science and Computing (MSC)– Rockville, MD

• Provided management and oversight support on laboratory-related activities in a large multicenter project including co-located and distributed teams and stakeholders.

• Facilitated and conducted agile coaching for aspiring scrum masters to enable the adoption of scrum at the company.

• Facilitated Scrum ceremonies which included backlog refinement, sprint planning, daily stand up, sprint reviews and sprint retrospectives.

• Utilized workflow, activity, and sequence diagrams to define functional requirements for the development team.

• Coached and trained teams on Agile practices and scrum pillars of transparency, inspect, and adapt which are necessary to cultivate a positive mindset to Agile methodologies.

• Proactively identified efficient ways to resolve issues to prevent interruptions and keep projects in progress and on track.

• Created a healthy work environment with open communications within the team to encourage feedback on issues that may impede their well-being and ability to deliver value.

• As servant leader, led by example by practicing scrum values of commitment, courage, openness, respect, and focus on all scrum ceremonies.

• Taught and modeled on core agile principles of collaboration, prioritization, team accountability and visibility.

• Collaborated with scrum team members, and the business management team to define solutions and drive progress.

• Enhanced stakeholder participation in projects by efficient coaching and facilitation PROJECT MANAGER / SCRUM MASTER 2011 to 2015

ICF International – Rockville, MD

• Experience working with multiple co-located and distributed teams on the development of a centralized biomarker data and sample testing management system. 3

• Facilitated internal and external communication across teams while improving on trust, transparency, and collaboration.

• Used Jira as main agile project management tool for issue tracking, risk mitigation, monitoring information radiators (Burn down/up, velocity, capacity charts) for team’s progress, and documenting project results.

• Facilitated team activities, prioritized the needs of the team, and proactively removed impediments that hindered progress in achieving value.

• Ensured that action items from retrospectives were completed in a timely manner.

• Facilitated the resolution of conflicts among internal (within and between teams) and external stakeholders professionally.

• Coached scrum teams to implement agile values, practices and principles of effective communication, and collaboration, continuous inspection, adaptation and improvement, transparency, and build trust within teams.

• Facilitated discussions with the product owner and business management stakeholders to define acceptance criteria for items in the product backlog, identified dependencies, ensured that each user story had enough details for clarity and met the definition of ready.

• Facilitated scrum team discussions on the importance of following team working agreement, so everyone understands what is expected as they work together in pursuit of delivering value.

• Mentored and coached teams to establish a culture of self-organization, self-management, and self- accountability for efficient and effective delivery of value at the end of each sprint.

• Led project management initiatives from ideation through development, implementation to completion within budget and schedule.

EDUCATION

Ph.D., Infectious Disease Epidemiology, University of Heidelberg, Germany, 2005 M.S., Biotechnology, University of Mannheim, Germany, 2001 B.Sc., Medical Laboratory Sciences, University of Calabar, Nigeria, 1996 Certifications:

1. Professional Scrum Master (PSM)

2. Certified Advanced SAFe 5.1 Scrum Master

3. Project Management Professional (PMP)

4. Quality Auditor Training (ASQ)

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