Consultant, Agile Leader

If you’re passionate about innovation and love working in an environment where you can constantly improve and adopt new technologies to drive business results, then Nationwide’s Information Technology team could be the place for you! At Nationwide®, “on your side” goes beyond just words. Our customers are at the center of everything we do and we’re looking for associates who are passionate about delivering extraordinary care.

This role will work a hybrid schedule coming into the Columbus, Ohio office 2 days per week (Mondays & Tuesdays).

Nationwide’s Software Engineering Solutions team is growing! We’re looking for a Consultant, Agile Leader to help drive software delivery excellence across our Personal Lines Solutions BSA and the broader P&C Technology organization. If you’re passionate about building and nurturing high-performing agile teams, we’d love to hear from you.

About the Role:

As a Consultant, Agile Leader, you will support agile delivery teams by removing obstacles, coaching for continuous improvement, and fostering a collaborative environment where team members thrive. You’ll work cross-functionally with developers, testers, analysts, and product owners to ensure teams are aligned, focused, and consistently delivering value.

Key Responsibilities:

Monitor agile software delivery team progress, using historical data, observations, and experience to support iteration goals and delivery commitments

Lead and support teams in delivering high-quality, working solutions in alignment with Agile principles

Remove impediments and blockers to maintain team momentum; escalate issues requiring broader attention

Coach and mentor team members and peers on Agile best practices and principles

Leverage Agile frameworks such as Scrum, Kanban, and Lean to enable team success and continuous improvement

Required Skills & Experience:

3–5 years of experience as an Agile Leader (Scrum Master)

Strong facilitation and coaching skills, with the ability to influence without authority

Deep understanding of Agile values and principles, and practical application of Scrum and related frameworks

Experience across the software delivery lifecycle (development, analysis, testing, deployment)

Proven ability to foster a servant leadership mindset and culture within and across teams

Nice to Have:

Experience using Jira and Planview for team and portfolio-level tracking

Proficiency in Power BI for visualizing metrics and data-driven insights

A-CSM (Advanced Certified ScrumMaster) certification

Familiarity with Policy Center or similar policy administration systems

Knowledge of Personal Lines insurance business and associated systems

Job Description SummaryIf you’re enthusiastic about delivering secure technology solutions to support a company providing extraordinary care to its customers, then Nationwide Technology is the place for you. Nationwide's industry-leading technology workforce embraces an agile work environment and a collaborative culture to deliver outstanding solutions and results. If that sounds like something you aspire to, we want to hear from you!

As an Agile Lead, you will coach a robust, self-organized Agile Team(s) responsible for building software solutions with the best technology, processes, and tools. You will collaborate to deliver business outcomes, using appropriate software delivery practices (e.g., Scrum, Kanban, Lean) to continuously improve software delivery efficiency, and quality. You will play a key role in guiding delivery from idea inception to implementation and participate in user communities to learn and implement optimal practices.

Job Description

Key Responsibilities:

Influences, coaches and mentors team members on Agile practices and principles.

Removes impediments to the team’s progress; escalate obstacles requiring outside resolution. Identifies risks and issues that might have an impact on delivery and provides thought leadership, facilitation, and communication on a mitigation strategy.

Responsible for applying secure software and systems engineering practices throughout the delivery lifecycle to ensure our data and technology solutions are protected from threats and vulnerabilities.

Collaborates at the highest level to prioritize work to maximize value towards business outcomes.

Collaborates with the Agile Team(s) to provide guidance in the areas of analysis, design, development, testing, automation, and deployment while ensuring the usage of the best capability practices.

Guides and enables DevOps, DataOps, AI/MLOps through the adoption and refinement of Agile practices on our most complex and strategic efforts.

Monitors and reports on team progress and performance through enterprise and industry metrics while maintaining data quality supporting metric accuracy.

Collaborates with senior leadership on demand and financials. Actively participates in variable staffing functions for the line.

Facilitates team cadences on business critical, complex efforts (e.g., retrospective, daily standups, and show-and-tell meetings) to encourage collaboration, communication, and feedback within the team; promote a learning culture and challenge the team to be innovative.

May perform other responsibilities as assigned.

Reporting Relationships: Reports to Technology Manager/Director.

Typical Skills and Experiences:

Education: Undergraduate studies in computer science, management information systems, mathematics or related field is preferred. Agile certification (Certified ScrumMaster – CSM, SAFe ScrumMaster Certification - SSM, Professional ScrumMaster Certification - PSM) and proven experience across multiple teams is a plus.

Experience: Typically, Six years of experience in Agile including three years as an Agile Leader or similar role. Strong technical expertise in one or more Agile practices and frameworks, including Scrum, Kanban, and Lean. Plus, a technical background in Software Engineering. Three or more years working with ALM tools and Microsoft Office Suite.

Knowledge, Abilities and Skills: Demonstrated ability to coach and mentor team members and peers. Ability to manage multiple teams and lead cross team initiatives. Strong candidates will put the team first, have excellent communication skills, robust problem-solving ability, conflict resolution skills and be active in the industry. Insurance and/or financial services industry knowledge a plus.

Other criteria, including leadership skills, competencies and experiences may take precedence.

Staffing exceptions to the above must be approved by the hiring manager’s leader and Human Resource Business Partner.

Values: Regularly and consistently demonstrates the Nationwide Values.

Job Conditions:

Overtime Eligibility: Not Eligible (Exempt)

Working Conditions: Hybrid to normal office environment. Associates may have on-call responsibility after normal working hours and/or on weekends.

ADA: The above statements cover what are generally believed to be principal and essential functions of this job. Specific circumstances may allow or require some people assigned to the job to perform a somewhat different combination of duties.

Benefits

We have an array of benefits to fit your needs, including: medical/dental/vision, life insurance, short and long term disability coverage, paid time off with newly hired associates receiving a minimum of 18 days paid time off each full calendar year pro-rated quarterly based on hire date, nine paid holidays, 8 hours of Lifetime paid time off, 8 hours of Unity Day paid time off, 401(k) with company match, company-paid pension plan, business casual attire, and more. To learn more about the benefits we offer, click here.

Nationwide is an equal opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive culture where everyone feels challenged, appreciated, respected and engaged. Nationwide prohibits discrimination and harassment and affords equal employment opportunities to employees and applicants without regard to any characteristic (or classification) protected by applicable law.

NOTE TO EMPLOYMENT AGENCIES:

We value the partnerships we have built with our preferred vendors. Nationwide does not accept unsolicited resumes from employment agencies. All resumes submitted by employment agencies directly to any Nationwide employee or hiring manager in any form without a signed Nationwide Client Services Agreement on file and search engagement for that position will be deemed unsolicited in nature. No fee will be paid in the event the candidate is subsequently hired as a result of the referral or through other means.

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