Senior Scrum Master

About The Role

The Product & Technology Group (PTG) at Blackbaud is seeking an experienced Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) Scrum Master within its Portfolio Management Office (PMO). This role will champion the effective use of the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) within engineering and development teams as they support the continuous delivery of large-scale, cloud-based software solutions within a larger Agile Release Train (ART). The role will focus on strengthening our agile project management discipline, while striving towards operational excellence and effective process management and adherence.

The desired candidate is well-versed and experienced with multiple delivery frameworks (SAFe, waterfall, etc.), with a focus on lean-agile delivery. They exhibit strong business acumen and operational excellence; have exemplary communication and collaboration skills; and reliably drive and support predictable and high-quality delivery across geographically distributed, cross-functional teams as they realize the product vision and provide value to the customer. This person is a problem-solver at heart and will use their expertise in agile methodologies and practices to tackle teams’ toughest challenges. They will have a passion for coaching empowered, high-performing agile teams; driving a culture of continuous improvement; and delivering secure, valuable, and high-quality solutions that delight our customers.

You will get to work in an exciting, supportive, and engaging agile environment where you will be encouraged to expand your skills, test your creative boundaries, share new ideas, and, most importantly, have fun!

What You’ll Do – Scrum Master

• Oversee overall delivery for 2-3 agile development teams including planning, execution, dependency management, risk management, release management, and stakeholder management.
• Facilitate agile ceremonies including daily stand-ups, iteration/sprint planning, iteration/sprint reviews, system demos, and iteration/sprint retrospectives.
• Assist agile teams in identifying and managing/remediating risks, dependencies, and impediments.
• Guide teams in the adoption, implementation, and maturation of SAFe practices, while supporting the overall SAFe transformation.
• Support the Release Training Engineer (RTE) with planning, coordination, and facilitation of the major events and ceremonies within SAFe, including quarterly PI Planning, System Demos, and Inspect & Adapt Workshops.
• Partner with your teams’ Product Owners to ensure backlog priorities are adjudicated and that conflicts are resolved prior to and throughout PI execution so your teams can limit Work in Progress (WIP), drive quality, deliver on their commitments, and realize business value.
• Manage and optimize the flow of value using tools like Miro, Azure DevOps (ADO), Dependency Charts, and Team Kanban.
• Resolve and escalate team-level impediments, manage team-level risks, and drive relentless improvement.
• Foster a safe, collaborative environment where your teams can deliver on commitments while feeling empowered to surface issues openly and honestly.
• Ensure clear communication and alignment between agile teams, other Scrum Masters, product owners, engineers, UX, strategic content, Customer Success, and other dependent teams (may include waterfall delivery teams and agile teams who do not live on the ART).
• Gather data from multiple sources, synthesize metrics, generate key insights, communicate team-level data within the train and across the business.
• Support the Release Train Engineer (RTE) and other ART leaders with forecasting, resource allocation, and monitoring of spend.
  
  

What You’ll Bring

• A bachelor’s degree in a technology-related field preferred.
• Certified SAFe Scrum Master (SSM), Safe Advance Scrum Master (SASM), SAFe Agilist (SA), or SAFe Practitioner (SP) preferred.
• 5 years of related experience with a Bachelor’s degree; or 3 years and a Master’s degree; or a PhD without experience; or equivalent work experience required.
• 2+ years acting in a Scrum Master role while managing cloud-based software development, software programs, or other technical delivery.
• Adept at organizing and leading outcomes-focused planning and problem-solving sessions within the context of an agile team.
• Ability to help teams deliver code that is secure, high quality and highly operable at scale as part of a DevSecOps culture.
• Strong technical aptitude to drive accountability and quality outcomes, while fostering collaboration across product and engineering functions.
• Experience leveraging, synthesizing, and clearly articulating agile metrics to glean insights on agile team status and maturation.
• Experience working in an agile organization especially Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe), or other scaling model.
• Experience using agile best practices (i.e., burndown charts, engaging retrospective formats, defect management, well-written User and Enable Stories, ATDD, TDD, BDD, CI/CD, automated testing, etc.).
• Experience with Agile collaboration tools (e.g., SharePoint, Microsoft Teams, Azure DevOps, etc.)
  
  

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Blackbaud is a digital-first company which embraces a flexible remote or hybrid work culture. Blackbaud supports hiring and career development for all roles from the location you are in today!

Blackbaud is proud to be an equal opportunity employer and is committed to maintaining an inclusive work environment. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, physical or mental disability, age, or veteran status or any other basis protected by federal, state, or local law.

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