Scrum Master

Discovery Limited; Pretoria; On-site; ZAR 500 000 - 700 000; Full time

Job summary

A leading health and wellness company in Pretoria is seeking an experienced Scrum Master to join their team. You will guide multiple scrum teams, facilitate scrum events, and support the adoption of Agile practices. Ideal candidates should have over 2 years of experience in a Scrum Master role and possess strong management and communication skills. This position offers a dynamic and collaborative work environment, encouraging continuous learning and innovation.

Qualifications

• At least 2-4 years’ experience working in a Scrum Master role.
• At least 2 years’ experience working in an agile environment.
• Experience within Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) advantageous.

Responsibilities

• Act as Scrum master for 2 – 4 scrum teams.
• Facilitate Scrum Events to ensure they are productive.
• Help facilitate Product Planning Workshops.

Skills

Stress Management

Time management and prioritization

Learning orientation

Innovation

Bias for action

Teamwork and co-operation

Strong management skills

Education

Matric

Certified scrum master/scrum practitioner

Tertiary degree (B. Engineer, B.Com, BSC)

Tools

JIRA

ServiceNow IT Business Management

Job description

About Discovery

Discovery’s core purpose is to make people healthier and to enhance and protect their lives. We seek out and invest in exceptional individuals who understand and support our core purpose, and whose own values align with those of Discovery. Our fast-paced and dynamic environment enables smart, self-driven people to be their best. As global thought leaders, Discovery is passionate about innovating in order to not only achieve financial success, but to ignite positive and meaningful change within our society.

About Vitality Group

Vitality Group, a subsidiary of Discovery Limited is responsible for the expansion of the Vitality Shared-Value Insurance business model beyond South Africa and the UK, serving to fully leverage the assets and intellectual property of Discovery beyond its primary markets. The business forms equity or contractual partnerships with leading global insurers to integrate Vitality and shared value with partner’s insurance and financial services products in the markets where they operate. Vitality Group also operates a business providing wellness solutions to employer groups in the United States. Vitality Health International, a business unit within Vitality Group coordinates and focuses on resource allocation to Discovery’s emerging, global health insurance initiatives. Vitality Group is also responsible for Discovery’s 25 percent equity investment in Ping An Health, the largest comprehensive medical insurer in China.

To date, Vitality Group’s businesses jointly reach more than 27 million unique lives across 38 markets (Argentina, Austria, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Czech Republic, China, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ecuador, France, Germany, Ghana, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Kenya, Macao, Malaysia, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nigeria, Pakistan, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Korea, Spain, Sri Lanka, Thailand, the United States, Vietnam and Zambia) as well as our primary markets in South Africa and the United Kingdom.

Key Purpose

• Is a servant‑leader for the Scrum Team that does anything possible to help the team perform at their highest level
• Help form a self‑managed team that is motivated, predictable, transparent and consistently delivers quality work and continually inspects and adapts in order to improve and maximize throughput whilst upholding the Agile values, principles and practices
• Facilitates the removal of impediments teams face when developing solutions
• Implements agile best practices within a team
• Helps the development team, business and management develop a culture of collaboration — Act as a change agent to the team and organisation
• Supports the team to be self‑organising and function as an accountable, high performance team
• Focused and goal driven and helps to achieve the Sprint goals
• Be a master facilitator

Areas of responsibility may include but not limited to

• Act as Scrum master for 2 – 4 scrum teams with a focus on guiding the teams towards improving the way they work.
• Facilitate Scrum Events ensure that they are focused and productive (Daily Stand-ups, Sprint Planning, Sprint Reviews, Retrospectives and Backlog Grooming)
• Help facilitate Product Planning Workshops and Release Planning Sessions
• Assist the Product Owner in prioritisation and scheduling of work, to meet delivery time frames
• Ensure backlog is in good standing by having regular re‑occurring weekly backlog grooming sessions
• Ensure that all the team members understand their role and fulfil them to the best of their ability
• Guide/coach/mentor the development team to take on the responsibilities of the process and ownership of the product – lead the team to a self‑organised state
• Build a high performing team, focusing on improving team dynamics and performance, help the team manage interpersonal conflicts, challenges and opportunities for growth.
• Protect the team from interruptions and distractions to maximize productivity and create flow of work
• Identify and facilitate the resolution of identified impediments
• Help the team make achievable sprint commitments with the use of velocity data and team availability
• Help the team members communicate, co‑ordinate and meet their delivery goals
• Ensure the team / stakeholders adhere to Definition of Ready (DoR) / Definition of Done (DoD)
• Highlight risks and dysfunctions where the DoR / DoD is not met
• Ensure the team uses the standardized reference story for estimating
• Ensure understanding of the Agile principles and Scrum process, across teams and stakeholders
• Ensure adherence to the Agile principles and Scrum process and help resolve any deviations
• Raise issues that are putting delivery at risk as soon as they arise
• Help facilitate delivery solutions and manage expectations
• Responsible to produce the following artefacts (Weekly Sprint Reports, Release projection / Burndown) to create visibility and transparency of the progress and status of the systems delivery
• Continually grow and share Agile knowledge.

Personal Attributes and Skills

Behavioral Skills

• Stress Management
• Time management and prioritization
• Learning orientation
• Innovation
• Bias for action
• Teamwork and co‑operation
• Strong management skills

Technical Skills

• Knowledge and/or experience of Kanban
• Knowledge of the software development life cycle
• Essential you are fully proficient at Jira administration, for example:
  • Understand the JIRA data model
  • Create and maintain workflows, transitions, post actions, etc.
  • Plugin evaluation
  • Project administration
  • Create and maintain Users and Security Groups
  • Proficient in writing JQL queries
  • Create and maintain fields and field configurations, screens and screen configurations
• Excellent communication skills in English in written and spoken form
• Working with ServiceNow IT Business Management (ITBM) advantageous

Other

• Overtime may be required from time to time

Education and Experience

Education:

• Matric
• Certified scrum master/scrum practitioner
• Tertiary degree (B. Engineer, B.Com, BSC) advantageous

Experience:

• At least 2-4 years’ experience working in a Scrum Master role
• At least 2 years’ experience working in an agile environment, preferably in a variety of situations
• Experience working within Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) advantageous

EMPLOYMENT EQUITY

The Company’s approved Employment Equity Plan and Targets will be considered as part of the recruitment process. As an Equal Opportunities employer, we actively encourage and welcome people with various disabilities to apply.