With 8 months of full-fledged Agile under our belts here at Valpak, it was high time for me to update the job description for my team of Project Managers. The point being to not only match the day-to-day activities of the job with the written description, but also to best reflect where we are at in our Agile transformation and our continued commitment to the cause. With little help from the Internet (that’s right … this was mostly created from scratch!), I created a new job description for “Agile Project Leader” and re-titled my entire team.
- “Agile” for our commitment to living the values and principles established by The Agile Manifesto,
- “Project” because we view things best through our project lenses,
- And, “Leader” because we strive to truly lead and not just manage.
Since I was hard pressed to find any real world examples of job descriptions for “Agile Project Leader”, I figured I’d share mine with the community (that’s you!).
Next up … I need to update my own job description too!
JOB DESCRIPTION: AGILE PROJECT LEADER
Summary:
Leadership of technology-focused projects and teams relying on Agile values and principles. This position assumes the role of ScrumMaster, Kanban Lead, and/or Project Manager depending on the work at hand. The focus of this position is on delivering value over meeting constraints, leading the team over managing tasks, and adapting to change over conforming to plans.
Essential Duties and Responsibilities:
- In the Project Manager role, leads complex initiatives across multiple functions and teams by planning, directing, and coordinating to the project objectives with consideration for risk.
- In the ScrumMaster role, facilitates the Scrum process of planning, daily stand-ups, reviews, and retrospectives with team and Product Owner and proactively removes impediments to progress.
- In the Kanban Lead role, facilitates the Kanban process with team and stakeholders and proactively removes impediments to progress.
- Leads and contributes to the decision making process and facilitates conflict resolution.
- Embraces, coaches, and evangelizes Agile values and principles across the organization and in the community.
- Defines and refines Agile metrics to understand team performance.
- Works with management and other Agile Project Leaders to continually identify and implement organization-wide process improvements
- Performs related work and additional duties as needed or required.
Education/Experience:
Bachelors degree in a technology field or related degree. Minimum 4+ years of project management experience and 1 year experience with Agile software development methodologies, namely Scrum and/or Kanban. Additional years of directly related relevant experience may be substituted for the educational requirement.
Qualifications:
- Strong analytical and problem solving skills
- Detail-oriented and highly organized
- Strong presentation and communication skills
- Self-motivated driver able to make progress despite obstacles
- Strong servant leader able to lead and work with multiple diverse roles and personalities
- One or more related certifications such as Project Management Professional (PMP), PMI-Agile Certified Practitioner (PMI-ACP), or Certified ScrumMaster (CSM) preferred.
