Agile Release Lead

Foundation Finance Company, LLC; Rothschild (WI); Remote; USD 122,000 - 125,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading financial services firm is looking for an Agile Release Lead to enhance Agile delivery and streamline software release processes. The ideal candidate will have a Bachelor’s degree in a technical field and at least 3 years of experience in software project management, specifically in Agile environments. This role offers a competitive salary and comprehensive benefits in a fast-paced work environment.

Benefits

Medical, dental, and vision benefits

401(k) with company match

Casual dress work environment

Qualifications

• Minimum 3 years managing software projects or releases in a Cloud environment.
• Deep understanding of Agile best practices.
• Strong grasp of software development lifecycle.

Responsibilities

• Define, implement, and improve Agile best practices.
• Train & mentor on Jira usage.
• Own technical release planning and readiness activities.

Skills

Agile frameworks

Release management

Conflict resolution

CI/CD pipelines

Education

Bachelor’s degree in software engineering or related field

Tools

Jira

Jenkins

GitHub

BitBucket

Job description

Agile Release Lead & Duties:

The Agile Release Lead will create, continuously refine and mature Agile delivery excellence and orchestrate seamless software delivery processes across technical, product, and business teams. This role ensures that Agile principles are embedded in company culture and that the software release process is predictable, efficient, and continuously improving so teams ship fully tested, high quality software at an optimal rate of delivery.

Pay Range: USD $122,000.00 - USD $125,000.00 /Yr.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities

• Define, implement, and continuously improve Agile best practices across IT teams and standardize key processes and artifacts (Definition of Ready, Definition of Done, reference stories, velocity trackers capacity planners) to support the full software development lifecycle. Act as Jira SME to train & mentor others.
• Regularly assess Agile maturity, team dynamics, and trust levels across teams and leadership. Identify and remove impediments impacting team health, velocity, and delivery performance.
• Implement and maintain Agile delivery and release management tools, create and effectively manage Jira projects, dashboards, and reports to track team performance, release status and quality.
• Actively interact with cross-functional team members and others to foster a culture of continuous improvement through introspection, mentoring, and guidance toward improved agile delivery processes.
• Solicit information from stakeholders, product owners, and technical teams to create and maintain a release roadmap aligned with project timelines and enterprise priorities. Align Jira release versions to roadmap and ensure release plans optimize delivery of completed functionality and meet compliance standards (e.g. SOC2, audit compliance).
• Own the Change Advisory Board (CAB) process, including scheduling, facilitation, and documentation, review or create Requests for Change to validate business intent and ensure accuracy of release contents, manage CAB artifacts in Jira and serve as the key point of contact for release questions.
• Own technical release planning and readiness activities across impacted functional areas and create and maintain the Release Playbook and calendar, leading readiness reviews, including CI/CD Pipeline status, environment readiness, code validation, testing status, pre-deployment preparations, implementation steps, post-deployment validation, rollback planning, and Production support plans, facilitate Go/NoGo activities, ensure business and technical teams are aligned on the release plan.
• Ensure organized, low-risk deployments through structured promotion of code across environments (Dev to Prod) and coordinate and monitor deployment execution (including phased blue/green or canary release strategies), post-deployment testing, Hypercare monitoring, defect SLA’s, and support handoff plans. Promote adoption of deployment techniques like feature flags.
• Standardize and own the release communication process, providing clear updates on release readiness, implementation status, issue mitigation plans and post-release outcomes, lead Release Retrospectives, create and publish key release metrics that ensure visibility and accountability.
• Partner with DevOps to ensure robust monitoring systems are in place and collaborate with technical teams to track and prioritize production environment issues and defects identified during deployment and Hypercare, lead Hotfix release planning and execution; drive root cause analysis of problematic releases.
• Other duties as assigned by management. Must be able to come to work promptly and regularly. Must be able to take direction and work well with others. Must be able to work under the stress of deadlines. Must be able to concentrate and perform accurately. Must be able to react to change productively.

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in software engineering, computer science or related technical IT field and minimum 3 years managing software projects or releases in a Cloud environment (AWS preferred).
• Deep understanding of Agile frameworks and best practices.
• Strong grasp of software development lifecycle and release management tools & techniques.
• Excellent facilitation, coaching, and conflict resolution skills.
• Preferred: Experience working with CI/CD pipelines, release tools such as Jenkins, BitBucket, GitHub, release automation tools, feature flag tools.

About Foundation Finance

Foundation Finance Company (FFC) is one of the fastest-growing consumer finance companies in the U.S. We work with home improvement contractors nationwide to help them close more sales through the use of flexible financing plans. FFC\'s full-spectrum lending approach has driven billions in originations and helped many customers make needed improvements to their homes. We\'re making big investments in both infrastructure and employee talent to keep up with our growth, so the time is right to join our team! It\'s a fast-paced environment with room to advance. We offer a competitive salary, medical/dental/vision benefits, 401(k) with company match, a casual dress work environment and much, much, more.

Office environment with significant time spent sitting, typing and talking on the telephone.

Foundation Finance Company provides equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type without regard to race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local laws. This policy applies to all terms and conditions of employment, including recruiting, hiring, placement, promotion, termination, layoff, recall, transfer, leaves of absence, compensation and training.

If you reside in the state of Colorado, please click on the following link to review our benefits: Foundation Finance Benefits

These benefits are designed to support our employees in their professional growth, health, and overall well-being. Eligibility, coverage details, and enrollment processes will be provided during the onboarding process. At Foundation Finance Company, we are committed to fostering a positive work environment where employees can thrive both personally and professionally.

Remote Work Disclaimer

Foundation Finance Company LLC requires that remote employees must reside in one of the following states to be considered for any of our remote positions: AL, AR, AZ, CO, CT, FL, GA, IL, IN, KY, LA, MD, ME, MI, MN, MO, MS, NC, NJ, NV, NY, OH, OK, OR, SC, TN, TX, UT, VA, WA, and WI.