Xeniah Winstone

Professional Scrum Master

780-***-**** adu2st@r.postjobfree.com

Accomplished professional Scrum Master with a proven track record and over five years of experience as a project manager. Skilled in diplomacy and highly organized to drive change, improve processes, and build trust. Highly proficient in planning, scheduling, and coordinating daily scrums, sprint planning, sprint reviews, identifying project risks, and performing sprint retrospectives. Adept at moving rapidly, understanding my audience, and leveraging incremental enhancements to drive compounding improvements.

CORE COMPETENCIES

• Agile Methodologies

• Training Development, Coaching & Servants Leader

• Team Builder, Facilitation, & Removing Blockers

• Proactive & Focused on Continuously Improving

• Communication & Collaboration

• Critical Thinker & Influential

• Conflict Resolution

• Loyal & Dedicated

PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE

Dunamis Agile Consulting Inc. (Contract) November 2019 – Present

Scrum Master, Edmonton, CA

• Facilitate scrum events (daily stay up, sprint planning, sprint review (demo), sprint retrospective, release planning, and other related meetings with scrum teams and stakeholders

• Protect my development team from external interruption which could affect their productivity and efficiency

• Ensured each of the User Stories are well defined; contained the who, what, and why and meet the INVEST criteria before they are estimated by the team during the product backlog refinement sessions

• Protect the team from over commitment and disruption during sprints

• Created an open and trust-based environment, which enhances a focus on delivery and facilitates continuous improvement of valuable products

• Worked with the development team and product owner to maintain a prioritized and prepared backlog and plan upcoming releases

• Collaborated with the development team to create high value products

• Used metrics such as velocity, burn down and burn up charts as well as qualitative metrics such as team self-assessments, to keep tabs on the progress of sprints to ensure a positive and predictable sprint outcome after each iteration

• Establish multiple collaborative relationships with business and technology partners at various levels within the organization

• Monitored the status of user stories, sprint release/progress, team velocity, and capacity

• Worked with product owner on artifacts such as product backlog, sprint backlog, product increment

• Worked with the development team and product owner to maintain a prioritized and prepared backlog, plan upcoming releases, and assist the team in drafting acceptance criteria and test plans

• Led the scrum team in using Agile methodology and scrum practices

• Worked with the product owner and development team to achieve customer satisfaction

Rogers Communication (Contract) March 2017 – October 2019

Scrum Master, Edmonton, CA

• Transitioned teams from Waterfall to Agile by: Introducing Agile to the executive leadership team, emphasizing on the benefits of Agile over Waterfall, most importantly, how it drives faster release cycles to get valuable products in the hands of consumers,

increasing returns on investment and withstanding competition from other companies going Agile

• Created small teams to kick start Agile pilot projects, taking baby steps and proving it works for the organization

• Getting everyone in the organization involved in continuous training on Agile practices from start and throughout the process

• Facilitated Scrum Ceremonies including daily stand ups, backlog refinement, sprint planning, sprint reviews, and sprint retrospectives

• Enlightened the scrum teams and the organization on the values of scrum

• Provided guidance to the team to create script files for sprints per User story

• Assisted the team by eliminating impediments to ensure user stories meet the definition of done

• Facilitated communications with distributed team members in different time zones

• Assisted product owner in creating backlog for sprints

• Ensured that development teams are practicing the core agile principles of collaboration, prioritization, team accountability and visibility.

• Selected Agile tool for project which resulted in the identification of a suitable agile lifecycle management tool for enterprise-wide adoption (JIRA)

• Participated and organized requirement gathering sessions with the stakeholders to elicit and analyze requirements

• Worked with all facet’s providers of software development from requirements gathering to testing, configuration and international deployment

• Communicated with relevant stakeholders and PO and was able to integrate their business needs into the team’s developed product release

Walmart (Contract) November 2015 – February 2017

Scrum Master, Edmonton, CA

• Provided excellent transition from waterfall to Agile Methodology

• Coordinate internal resources and third parties /vendors for the flawless execution of projects

• Facilitated Scrum events (Daily Scrum, Refinement, Planning, Review and Retrospective) with focus on value delivery and continuous improvement

• Helped the team to stay focused (e.g., by acting as a buffer between external distractions and the team)

• Helped the team to maintain their scrum tools (story board, action board, charts and backlogs etc.)

• Actively observed team dynamics to recognize strengths and weaknesses of individual team members contributions, and coach them to improve

• Facilitated the definition of ready and definition of done criteria for all stories

• Coached the team to understand the importance of Agile

• Helped the team in estimation

MGA Management - May 2012 – October 2015

Project Manager, Edmonton, CA

• Ensured resource availability and allocation

• Assisted in the definition of project scope and objectives, involving all relevant stakeholders and ensuring technical feasibility

• Developed a detailed project plan to monitor and track progress

• Managed changes to the project scope, project schedule and project costs using appropriate verification techniques

• Measured project performance using appropriate tools and techniques

• Performed risk management to minimize project risks

• Established and maintain relationships with third parties

• Created and maintain comprehensive project documentation

• Delegated project tasks based on junior staff members, individual strengths, skill sets and experience level

• Tracked project performance, specifically to analyze the successful completion of tactical and strategic goals

• Met budgetary objectives and make adjustments to project constraints based on financial analysis

• Develop Comprehensive project plans to be shared with clients as well as other staff members

• Used and continuously developed leadership skills to ensure timely delivery of projects and collaboration

Bead World Inc. - March 2010 – April 2012

Assistant Project Manager, Edmonton, CA

• Reviewed and revised project schedules with senior management as needed

• Managed project staff in accordance with company policies and practices

• Executed projects according to project plans, developed forms and record document every step of project activities

• Monitored progress of project and made necessary adjustments to ensure successful completions

• Ensured project deliverables were on time, within budget and at optimal quality

• Liaised customer preventatives to ensure sound understanding of requirements, smooth operations and effective service delivery

• Collaborated with various teams and delivered high performance under pressure within a competitive, commercial environment while effectively ensuring team success and organizational benefit

• Administered all aspects of hiring, terminating, training, scheduling and payroll utilizing ADP software of personnel while operating within an assigned budget

• Effectively manage internal, external and cross-functional program resources to complete goals and initiatives

PLATFORMS & TOOLS

• MS Office & MS 365 (Outlook, PowerPoint, Word, Excel), MS Teams

• Experienced with various Agile frameworks including Scrum, Kanban Principles, and SAFe

• Strong technical command of management tools, such as Jira, Version one rally

• Scrum Ceremonies and Product Backlog Grooming

• Relative Estimation and Story-Based Development

• Experienced in Agile techniques: User Stories and Continuous Integration

• Ticketing tools such as Jira, Miro, Confluence

EDUCATION

• SAFe Certification (in progress)

• Professional Scrum Master (PSM1): International Scrum Institute

• Bowling Green State University, Bowling Green, Ohio: BSBA - Business Administration

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