AMAAH PENN

Agile Consultant

Baltimore, MD

Cell: 202-***-****

adq7vv@r.postjobfree.com

OBJECTIVES

Several years of professional experience as an Agile software development professional with outstanding motivation to servant lead, facilitate, organize, and coach multiple scrum teams. Extensive knowledge in software development lifecycle (SDLC) within multiple domain such as Digital Software Transformation, Healthcare, Supply Chain, Manufacturing, B2B and B2C Digital Market Platform. Excellent facilitator with ability to effectively manage a Technical Team both offshore and onshore. I quickly comprehend complex projects and guide it through full Standards and Processes. I am highly skilled and knowledgeable in Agile Transformation and Agile sustainment with both experience in new Agile methodologies. Closely worked and collaborated with Product managers on Project Deadlines, User Experience, Roadmaps, Story Mappings and Backlog creation. I effectively facilitated all Scrum ceremonies consistently. I am passionate about Agile methodologies such as Safe, Scrum, Kanban, LeSS, Crystal, DSDM, Lean and XP. I have facilitated multiple teams simultaneously with co-located, distributed, and offshore and a huge experience working with different Agile Project management tools like JIRA/Confluence, AHA, Rally, Visio, Visual, Trello, Asana, Invision, Zeplin, Studio, Microsoft TFS and others.

Work Experience.

Agile Delivery Coach, IMC Digital

Juniper International Market Centers Juno Beach FL

November 2020 to Present

Project Overview:

IMC is the B2B Marketplace for the Home Furnishings, Gift, and Apparel Industries and was launching an E-Marketplace – Juniper. Juniper is powered by the Digital Innovations division of IMC. Juniper is a full suite of B2B digital sales and marketing solution, sales and automation software, branded e-commerce websites, customer and product data management tools, multi-line B2B wholesale ecommerce marketplace. Our team successfully built the Juniper Initiative from scratch on all mobile platforms to support all the B2B commerce. Using different Agile methodologies, we can positively impact the lives of the buyers and sellers and create an environment where they are having a digital world for their businesses and create a wholesale community where members can stay connected however, they choose...anytime, everywhere.

Agile Champion

Implement Scrum Framework from ground zero to facilitate requirement gathering, Design thinking, Sprint Planning, Backlog Grooming, Daily Scrums, Sprint Reviews and Sprint Retrospectives.

Lead Agile Delivery Methodology including daily scrum, sprint reviews & planning meetings to realize full team engagement

Promote core Agile principles & practices within the Scrum Team to shorten cycle time & achieve target margins, encouraging team cohesion, and overcoming impediments & hurdles to improve quality & productivity.

Strive to improve Agile awareness and adoption as per Agile processes in each sprint Research emerging technologies and current trends that could benefit Scrum Team, assessing each scrum team member's responsibilities and delegating tasks to balance each employee's workload.

Act as an Agile SME to Teams, Product Owners, and Management; participating in Scrum Master Community of Practice,

Manage backlog aging and tracking; burn down metrics, velocity, and capacity planning

Project Coordination & Reporting

Oversee complex, high-value technical projects; scheduling, tracking, coordinating & ensuring efficient / on-time delivery of project tasks & milestones and following proper escalation paths

Report daily program progress and status to management

Work with the Product Owner to groom Product Backlog, define and support release strategy to the Scrum Team

Lead and mentor teams in multi-facility (onsite & offshore team) environments and maximizing levels of productivity

Leadership Excellence and Conflict Resolution

Shield Scrum Team from external interference for optimal productivity and success of Agile process

Remove impediments to allow team to deliver the business objective; escalating impediments to facilitate rapid resolution.

Provide transparency on team's progress/productivity through appropriate progress tools, information radiators, and reports.

Maintain effective communication within and across teams; facilitate the empowerment of a self-organizing team.

Perform risk, and dependency management for the team; ensure release management practices align to enterprise standards.

Encourage teams to leverage release-when ready, test-driven development, continuous integration, product demonstration and other technical engineering practices.

Program Delivery Lead

Florida Blue/Guide well

Jacksonville, FL

April 2020 to October 2020.

Project Overview:

The details of this project were to digitalize and enhance the health insurance and benefits portal for all the Florida blue benefactors and the carriers for these health insurances.

Oversee design, implementation, QA, and validation of programming code and products

Develops detailed work plans, schedules, project estimates, resource plans and status reports

Facilitate daily scrums, stand-ups, and meetings to monitor project progress and resolve any issues the team may be experiencing

Produces risk analysis and risk mitigation plans

Responsible for project tracking and analysis

Manages vendor selection, contract negotiations, the integration of vendor tasks into the work plan and tracks and reviews vendor deliverables

Ensure milestones are reached and deadlines are met throughout project lifecycle

Build strong relationships with stakeholders, application users, and program owners

Document progress and communicate to upper management and stakeholders

Take responsibility for successful product delivery

Agile Delivery Manager /RTE (Crew App Team),

Excalibur Digital Project, Royal Caribbean Cruises Miami, FL

May 2019 to April 2020.

Project Overview:

The aim of this project was to deliver and support digital products to 85K+ employees and the Guest of Royal Caribbean Ships in a SAFe environment and opportunity to utilize other Agile methodologies to follow the delivery processes. Our Team was able to do a digital Product transformation of our whole Crew and Guest experience by providing a unified point of communication, a greater sense of community, and work/life resources for the shipboard and shoreside Crew. We built mobile applications from scratch using open-source mobile application React Native, React JS framework. We also used cloud platforms like AWS Cloud infrastructure applications and Azure pipelines to deliver awesome digital experiences to make work and life balance for over 25000 Crew Members both on ship and off ship. We wanted to ‘wow’ our customer experience and create products with an intent to disrupt.

I successfully transformed a newly created team of about 65 members both onshore and offshore to a matured developed team using Tucker model of transformation with everyone conscious and very mindful all the Agile methodologies and Software development practices.

I was able track all the metrics, delivery processes and standards of all 5 Scrum teams and reported on a biweekly schedule with the Stake holders to review the progress of our commitments.

I oversaw the weekly Scrum of Scrum Meetings with Product, Engineering, Design, Architecture Leads to discuss an overview of dependencies and feasibility for all the Features and Epics in development for our entire project.

I coordinated and facilitated the Release plan and Release Versions of deployment of our product to production while working very closely with the Release Management teams to make sure we meet the requirements of all builds from Silver, Bronze and Gold Builds.

I guided and Servant led 5 Scrum Teams to self-organized and follow our delivery standards and processes while concentrating on managing our consistent Engineering delivery pipelines for Continuous deployments and Continuous integration (CI/CD).

I was involved in the hiring process, mentored, and coached 4 Scrum Masters who were directly reporting to me and distributed across the entire project in which I was Scrum delivery lead on how to Scale and support teams to deliver software in a consistent delivery standard using Agile methodologies as guidelines.

I successfully introduced other Lean Agile delivery methodologies like MOB Programming within the project. Our teams were created in a PODS structure of developing software and successfully scaled our features across all platforms.

I directly supported 4 different resources which were both offshore and onshore and served as a bridge between those teams to better communicate and participate to all our Scrum Ceremonies from standups to Retrospectives.

I facilitated sessions with all the DevOps Tech Leads in Agile processes on how to grant access and set our code base environments, and processes on granting access to some pipelines like Jenkins and SonarQube and set up our Data Models and designs

I collaborated with the Engineering Leads, Product Managers and Architects to set up processes to help the DevOps teams create URLS, endpoints which helped in our code deployment process and environments which facilitated our engineering excellence processes and so set up great Data security mechanism to help with our project.

I was the RTE for the Crew App team who facilitated and organized PI (Program increments) Planning sessions, Scrum of Scrum meetings between all Scrum and delivery teams and with Architecture, Engineering and Product teams to identify and keep the timeline for Release train iterations, identify features feasibility and review Road maps for the teams.

Collaborated with peers and Agile Delivery Leads to better understand departmental goals and coach team towards accomplishing those goals.

Established an environment of Trust and Commitment within 5 development teams which motivated everyone to help deliver one the fastest software across numerous crew ships.

Trained all the Product Owners and Product Mangers on better Feature/Epic planning and Story Mapping sessions to meet customer requirements and our deliverables.

Document team action plans during sprint retrospective meetings and help organized team member to take ownership to come up with solutions before the next ceremony.

Burris Logistics Jacksonville, FL

Sr. Scrum Master

December 2017 – May 2019

Project Overview:

We were working on enhancing the Web based application portal for our customers to be able to order through the DSD (Direct Store Delivery) and E-commerce logistic processes as quicker as possible. The intention for the project was to build a very user-friendly web portal where consumer home good from the distribution centers could be ordered and delivered on time.

Executed role of a Scrum Master accountable for guiding the planning, tracking and day to day activities of two web development teams during its project implementation and transition from Waterfall to Agile methodology.

Ensures the team follows Scrum processes by coordinating Sprint Planning and Sprint Review, leading Daily Scrums, and facilitating Sprint Retrospectives.

Help the team with their daily impediments by coordinating what is a called a Parking lot Team meeting

Engaged with other Scrum Masters to increase the effectiveness of the application of Scrum in the organization.

Take responsibility for managing dependencies between the Scrum Team and others collaborating with the Scrum Master network especially regarding items necessary for product release.

Track and communicate team status and progress via burnup and burndown charts, as well as other information radiators, to the team, management, and Stakeholders ensuring it accurately reflects current state.

Champion Agile Software development best practices to improve code quality and delivery.

Consistently striving for continuous improvement with the team, as well as Stakeholders – coordinating deliverables.

Agile Coach/Sr. Scrum Master

Nestle USA, Laurel MD

May 2012 – December 2017

Project Overview:

Facilitated the transition from Waterfall Methodologies environment to Agile while serving as the scrum master for multiple teams simultaneously. The Project was a Cloud AWS infrastructure Web-based Application used to enhance the end users experience by adding additional features and fixing existing defects. Nestle USA switched to SAP GLOBE and its Data and infrastructure had to be migrated from Oracle RDBMS to SAP. So new features had to be integrated with the user interface to help the users utilize the warehouse functions with the newly integrated SAP.

Agile coach Role

I oversaw planning, coordinating, monitoring, and directing the complex and diverse activities associated with customer implementations through workshops and Training. In this role I was the primary communication hub between the Supply chain manager, the Product Director, and the implementation team. I help the company to foresee or predict risks and plan, organize and control activities to complete projects on time and within budget of a fiscal year per quarter division.

I was able to collaborate cross-functional teams, stakeholders, and sponsors across multiple geographies within the global product development community and the Nestle network. I successfully transformed the Nestle Distribution unit by embodying an agile mindset using Tuckerman model of transformation while focusing on supporting my assigned teams. In all the above I was still able to coach the internal teams by facilitating and collaborating with the tech leads and the resources involved in delivering on a broad program of work. As a servant leader, I included agile coaching and mentoring as well as establishing a continuous plan of action to improve the company’s success toward commitments and goals.

Successfully applied the Scrum Framework and principles of agility to the benefit of the Nestle Distribution team and organization

Embody agility using a servant leadership approach and leading by example

Coach the Product Managers in effective Story mapping and Kanban feature creation.

Coach the Scrum Master in removing impediments that are preventing the team from accomplishing their goals. Help the team learn to identify dependencies, skill/knowledge gaps, and other impediments for their work

Facilitate Scrum events and activities as necessary and ensure the team is realizing value from them (Scrums of Scrums, Demos, Agile Training sessions).

Manage and release software in a regulated environment

Work with product owners and other stakeholders to ensure team alignment with commitments to the businesses and sync points with other teams

Manage software release activities and documentation, including coordination with all applicable stakeholders

Manage and communicate the implementation of significant changes to planning objectives, schedule, and product configuration to internal and external stakeholders

Formal presentation of program status. Establish and regularly review key team metrics including resourcing, and performance trends planning cadence

Ensure the implementation of management systems within their area of responsibility (including health & safety, quality & environmental)

As a Scrum Master I facilitate the removal of impediments for the team by targeting the issue internally within the team, escalating to the right company personnel or to other external teams as needed

Established relationship with Product owner and other stakeholders to engage them in collaboration with our development team.

Helped and supported the product owner with product backlog grooming to make sure it was always up to date and prioritized.

Coached team members on agile principles and providing general guidance on the methodology.

Engaged with other Scrum Masters personally and through use of scrum of scrums to increase the effectiveness of the application of Scrum in the company and to keep track of dependencies.

Provided all support to the team using a servant leadership style whenever possible, and developed team building events.

Tracked and communicated team health and progress using metrics such as Velocity charts, Burndown charts, and Capacity.

Made sure Task boards were being updated to ensure Transparency and effective communication.

Scrum Master

Krystal Medical Associates Washington, DC

January 2011 – February 2012

Successfully converted team from a Waterfall Methodology environment to an Agile Methodology and guide via the Scrum pillars, values, and principles.

Acted as a Servant Leader to my Scrum Team, by shielding them from outside distractions and helping them with known impediments/roadblocks and enabled my team to work in a safe and friendly environment.

Facilitated a self-organizing team, cross functional team, and a collaborative team.

Collaborated with Product Owner via Pre-grooming, to prioritize, gain clarity and known dependencies on PBI.

Utilize JIRA to maintain product backlog, sprint backlog and create and track user stories, sprint planning, tracking, and managing sprints, created Scrum and Kanban boards, status reports and the burnup and burndown charts.

Education

●BA in Computer Science at University of Buea, Cameroon

●Master of Public Health (MPH) at Walden University

●CSM and PSM Certified Via Scrum Alliance

●SAFe® 5.0 Professional Certified, SASM

●ORACLE OCA Certified Associate.

●ORACLE SQL fundamental Certified Associate.

●AMAZON AWS Certified Developer Associate.

●AMAZON AWS Certified Solutions Associate.

●SIX SIGMA – Greenbelt Certification.

TECHNICAL SKILLS AND TOOLS

●Skills: ATDD, BDD, AWS Cloud DevOps, CI/CD, SAFe, Kanban, XP, SDLC, IAM (AWS Console)

●IAAC –Infrastructure as a Cloud (AWS) / Oracle Database Management.

●SDLC Tools: JIRA, Confluence, Rally, Smartsheets, Rational, Trello, TFS.

●Virtual Communication Tools: Slack, Teams, Skype, Google Hangout, Join Me, Zoom, Team Viewer.

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