WHAT DOES AN AGILE PROJECT MANAGER DO?

Published: Nov 20, 2024 – The Agile Project Manager manages the iterative development lifecycle by facilitating Scrum events and coaching teams in agile practices. This position tracks and mitigates risks, issues, and impediments while creating transparent Jira dashboards to monitor project progress. The manager also optimizes workflows and processes with a continuous improvement mindset to enhance team productivity and deliver user-focused outcomes.

A Review of Professional Skills and Functions for Agile Project Manager

1. Agile Project Manager Overview

  • Planning Increment: Participate and lead Planning Increment processes to define projects, estimate budgets, and facilitate prioritization.
  • Team Mobilization: Effectively mobilize project teams from basic objective information.
  • Project Scope and Scheduling: Define project scope and schedule while focusing on regular and timely delivery of value.
  • Executive Tollgates: Create and facilitate executive tollgates to align strategic objectives with agile team product release plans, and organize and lead project status and working meetings.
  • Progress Reporting: Prepare and distribute progress reports, manage risks and issues, correct deviations from plans, and perform delivery planning for assigned projects.
  • Risk and Issue Management: Manage risks and issues, correct deviations from plans, and ensure timely project delivery.
  • Business Value Achievement: Consistently achieve business value, a timely and cost-effectively.
  • Servant Leadership: Be the servant-leader for the team to ensure the team lives the agile values and principles and follows the processes and practices the team has agreed to utilize.
  • Team Coaching and Facilitation: Be the team coach and facilitator to remove blockers for effective product releases.
  • Relationship Building: Build effective relationships with resource managers to optimize team member participation.
  • Resource Planning and Allocation: Plan and manage the team structure and resource allocation plan, forecast, and actuals to support the delivery of assigned work.
  • Staffing Issue Resolution: Lead resource managers, PMO process coordinators, and program managers to identify and resolve staffing issues.

2. Agile Project Manager Details and Accountabilities

  • Strategic Planning: Strategic planning and tracking of collections of related Projects at a Program Level.
  • Project Management: Manage several concurrent Projects and/or Programs in a fast-paced environment.
  • Leadership: Lead Projects and/or Programs from conception through development to delivery ensuring adherence to Enterprise priorities and objectives.
  • Risk Management: Identify, track, and manage Project and/or Program risks for resolution.
  • Budget Management: Create and manage program operating plans and budgets.
  • Dependency Tracking: Track Project and/or Program dependencies using Enterprise Agile best practices.
  • Reporting: Produce accurate and timely reporting of Project and/or Program status throughout its life cycle.
  • Executive Communication: Communicate and present effectively at the executive level and command respect.
  • Vendor Management: Plan and manage vendor activities to support project and agile product delivery and effectively manage vendor relationship issues.
  • Contract Negotiation: Effectively negotiate contracts and statements of work.
  • Process Improvement: Contributes to and leads department process and tool improvements with the ability to define success criteria and demonstrate results.

3. Agile Project Manager Additional Details

  • Team Development: Be part of the team establishing and continuing to develop the basic principles, processes, roles, and responsibilities.
  • Agile Coaching: Coach the cross-functional, business-oriented teams, helping them improve their agile development with Scrum to deliver value and great customer experiences.
  • Facilitation: Facilitate refinement, planning, review, and retrospective events with the cross-functional teams.
  • Strategic Planning: Help develop long-term planning to achieve strategic goals.
  • Stakeholder Collaboration: Work closely with Y Soft C-level management and other key stakeholders (Sales, Marketing, IT).
  • Process Improvement: With support from business functions such as Finance and HR, help each team find new ways of working.
  • Financial Guidance: Provide expert guidance and recommendations to ensure accurate financial treatment of purchases, and effectively negotiate favorable pricing.
  • Activity Coordination: Coordinate the activity planning, sequencing, and development schedules.
  • Timeline Management: Deliver timeline and contribute to the overall product roadmap.
  • Collaboration: Collaborates with team members for specific project needs and contributes to the ongoing development of departmental procedures and processes.

4. Agile Project Manager Responsibilities

  • Agile Process Management: Co-design and manage agile project management processes and workflows (scrum, Kanban, Lean, Scrumban) within the marketing communications department and across the organization.
  • Cross-Team Collaboration: Collaborate across teams to build a common understanding of agile principles and culture within the organization.
  • Team Coordination: Continually interface with all teams, both inside and outside of marketing communications, to help the team effectively collaborate with others.
  • Strategic Prioritization: Apply a strategic perspective to help define user stories, prioritize the backlog, and streamline the execution of projects, keeping long-term strategic goals in the team’s sight.
  • Roadblock Management: Anticipate roadblocks and negotiate clear and transparent project management practices that engage stakeholders to make decisions, and ensure the team knows what to work on when.
  • Team Protection: Protect the team from external interruptions, separating legitimate emergencies and opportunities from unnecessary derailments.
  • Business Results Reporting: Accountable for reporting and demonstrating business results of the Marcom team’s work.
  • Client and Stakeholder Focus: Help ensure an ongoing commitment to the client and stakeholders-centric perspective within the team.
  • Agile Strategy Implementation: Develop and implement agile project management strategies and solutions for a rapidly growing business.
  • Project and Team Management: Accountable for the planning and managing of multiple projects and teams.

5. Agile Project Manager Roles and Responsibilities

  • Development Lifecycle Management: Manage the development lifecycle with an iterative and incremental approach (preferably Scrum) for multiple teams.
  • Meeting Facilitation: Facilitate recurring and ad hoc meetings within the development lifecycle (Stand-up, Sprint Planning, Refinement, Sprint Review, Sprint Retrospective).
  • Agile Coaching: Coach teams in agile practices.
  • Risk and Issue Management: Manage communication and escalation of risks, issues, and releases.
  • Impediment Removal: Identify and remove impediments and interruptions to team productivity.
  • Jira Dashboard Creation: Create meaningful Jira dashboards that provide real-time transparency into the status of sprints and projects (burndown, velocity, defect rates, etc.).
  • User Advocacy: Develop an understanding of Mastery's users and act as an advocate for their needs.
  • Risk Analysis: Analyze project risks and impacts and work with product and technology executives to mitigate issues.
  • Risk Tracking: Proactively manage issues and risk tracking and resolution within the Agile framework.
  • Continuous Improvement: Maintain a continuous improvement mindset for optimizing processes and workflows.
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