Scrum Master

Harvard Business Publishing (HBP) was founded in 1994 as a not-for-profit, wholly-owned subsidiary of Harvard University. Our mission is to improve the practice of management in a changing world. We do this by bringing together the best of academic research and real-world management expertise from around the globe. Through our multiple platforms, we publish ideas that inform and inspire managers, corporations, and educators. Harvard Business Publishing comprises three market groups: Corporate Learning (CL), Harvard Business Review Group (HBRG), and Higher Education (HE).

With approximately 450 employees, primarily based in Boston, with offices in New York City, India, and the United Kingdom, Harvard Business Publishing serves as a bridge between academia and enterprises around the globe through its publications and multiple platforms for content delivery, and its reach into three markets: academic, corporate, and individual managers.

Reporting to the Sr. Director of Operations, and working as a member of the Shared Platform Team the Scrum Master is responsible for planning, leading, organizing, and motivating the SPT team to achieve a high level of performance and quality to deliver software products to HBP internal business websites.

The Scrum Master is responsible for facilitating the creation and adoption of high visibility services developed in AWS using Agile methods in a fast-paced environment across multiple business divisions. He/She will be expected to use a high level of knowledge and experience with Agile principles and practices to fit large, complex, customer facing product development projects, and will provide the right balance of agility and predictability while encouraging a sustainable pace along with high levels of quality for the team.

This is a part time contract position, working approximately 20 hours per week.

Key Skills:

Project Planning and Management – Facilitate the definition of project scope and schedule while

focusing on regular and timely delivery of value; facilitate project status and working meetings;
provide appropriate information radiators; identify and remove impediments for the team; and
coordinate release communication with Enterprise IT

Team Building & Facilitation – Promote empowerment of the team and assist in team development;

leverage organizational resources to improve capacity for project work; coach team members;
facilitate team retrospectives and actions coming out of retrospectives; ensure that each team
member is fully engaged and making a meaning contribution

Process Management and Improvement – Define and manage a well-defined project management

process and champion ongoing process improvement initiatives to implement best practices for
Agile Project Management

Solid understanding of software development life cycle models, as well as knowledge of both Agile

and traditional project management principles and practices with the ability to blend them together
in the right proportions to fit a project and business environment

Ability to successfully implement software or web development projects using Agile methodologies

Experience overseeing multi-function project teams with at least seven team members, including
developers, UX resources, and QA personnel. Experience with remote and/or offshore teams is ideal

Sufficient level of technical background to provide highly-credible leadership to development teams

and the ability to accurately and objectively evaluate complex project risks and issues

Balanced business/technical background

Duties of the Scrum Master

Facilitate his/her team for better creativity and tries to improve the efficiency of the development team

Responsible for managing the scrum process with the coordination of scrum team in Agile methodology

Responsible to remove the impediments for the scrum team

Arrange daily stand-up meetings, facilitate meetings, schedule meetings, demo and decision-making processes in order to ensure quick inspection and proper use of adaptation process

Helps product owner to make the product backlogs in good shape and make them ready for the next sprint

Responsible for conducting retrospective meetings

Organize and facilitate the sprint planning meeting

Acts as safeguard for his/her team

The Scrum master is a servant first, who serves his team members before considering about him/herself

Requirements:

BA/BS

5yrs + Scrum Master experience in any well-known software development environment

JIRA/Confluence experience