Agile Consultant and Lead Trainer
smagile
(Other, < 10 employees)
Keywords
Scrum Methodology
Metrics
Kanban
Cycle Time Variation
Psychology
Public Service
Stakeholder Management
Team Building
Skills
So much about the Scrum framework correlates directly with my own personal values. I get a great deal of satisfaction from helping individuals, teams, and organisations realise the benefits of successful agile delivery (not limited to Scrum); Working hard to build strong teams focussed on delivering quality outcomes, value for money, and developing their desire for continuous improvement.
I am proud to say that I’ve consistently been able to earn the respect of teams and business stakeholders. Through feedback, I’ve learned that this has been primarily through remaining calm under pressure, communicating effectively ‘inwards and outwards’ (balancing transparency with shielding), nurturing people’s self-development and ultimately seeking to make myself redundant from the team.
The passion I have for helping others to succeed has led to my certification as 1 of only 5 people licensed to train The Agile Mastery Institute’s Scrum Mastery Pathway and Product Mastery Pathway learning journeys.
Key Career Highlights:
I am proud to say that I’ve consistently been able to earn the respect of teams and business stakeholders. Through feedback, I’ve learned that this has been primarily through remaining calm under pressure, communicating effectively ‘inwards and outwards’ (balancing transparency with shielding), nurturing people’s self-development and ultimately seeking to make myself redundant from the team.
The passion I have for helping others to succeed has led to my certification as 1 of only 5 people licensed to train The Agile Mastery Institute’s Scrum Mastery Pathway and Product Mastery Pathway learning journeys.
Key Career Highlights:
- Influenced enterprise improvement initiatives in a chaotic programme comprising ~20 delivery teams working on the same single products
- Leveraged micro learning to help insurance data and analytics team understand and leverage flow metrics; resulting in improved cycle time from greater than 99d to 22d within 4 month engagement.
- Introduced a number of measures such as OKRs, Kanban techniques (flow metrics) and increased psychological safety to a group of struggling, high profile scrum teams; leading to productivity and morale improvements within the team, as well as increased trust from stakeholders.
- Developed extensive familiarity working within National Security environments and supporting the UK counter-terrorism mission, and also >9 years experience working in other sectors such as public services, charity organisations, insurance, and the utilities industry.
Project history
02/2022
-
09/2023
- Lead consultant and trainer at smagile;
- Lead Scrum Master | Post Office UK Ltd
- Organisational agility advisor & lead SM within a 20 team system (single product).
- Quantified and addressed £30k-50k per week wastage on project plan maintenance.
- Introduced empiricism & flow management leveraging flight levels.
- Scrum Master | Leonardo UK
- 3 month engagement to experiment with Scrum on internal business development physical proof of concept demonstrator, which led to new sales with both new and existing customers.
- Produced maturity assessment, outlining key organisational challenges, and improvement recommendations, supported by evidence from POC and industry.
- Scrum Master/Product Owner | Standard Club (P&I Insurance)
- Initially SM and PO for a non-software development team, nurturing development of client Department Head to adopt PO accountability.
- Established agile community of practice, persisting beyond conclusion of the engagement.
- Revised KPIs used by Investment Review Board re. value and productivity.
- Lead Scrum Master | Post Office UK Ltd
02/2021
-
02/2022
Scrum Master
Raytheon UK
(Other, 1000-5000 employees)
- Served 8 person Scrum Team (1 of 4 within programme), leaving the team ‘high performance’.
- Tactfully introduced a raft of changes to established (in progress for 3 years) but struggling project, incl. facilitation of their self-selection split into 3 teams.
- Established Raytheon UK Agile Community of Practice.
- Line manager to 7 multi-skilled engineering staff.
- Used data surface otherwise unseen signals, including an example that enabled retention of a key team member that was silently unsatisfied.
06/2017
-
01/2021
Scrum Master & Delivery Manager
Civica Digital
* Directing work and outlining priorities for a supporting Project Manager and Scrum Masters.
* Mobilisation and motivation of 25 multi-skilled project staff, working from multiple sites.
* Mobilisation and motivation of 25 multi-skilled project staff, working from multiple sites.
06/2017
-
01/2021
Scrum Master & Delivery Manager
Civica Digital
(Internet and Information Technology, 500-1000 employees)
- Directing work and outlining priorities for a supporting Project Manager and Scrum Masters.
- Mobilisation and motivation of 25 multi-skilled project staff, working from multiple sites.
06/2015
-
04/2017
Senior Consultant - Delivery Manager & Scrum Master
Helyx SIS Ltd
* SM for company's first experiment utilising the Scrum Framework.
* Driving progress through software development lifecycle, including 'design to release readiness' of
£4m group of system upgrade products for Scottish Power.
* Supporting on and offshore teams; achieved both by travelling and remote working.
* Driving progress through software development lifecycle, including 'design to release readiness' of
£4m group of system upgrade products for Scottish Power.
* Supporting on and offshore teams; achieved both by travelling and remote working.
06/2015
-
02/2017
Senior Consultant - Delivery Manager & Scrum Master
Helyx SIS
(Internet and Information Technology, 10-50 employees)
- SM for company’s first experiment utilising the Scrum Framework.
- Driving progress through software development lifecycle, including ‘design to release readiness’ of £4m group of system upgrade products for Scottish Power.
- Supporting on and offshore teams; achieved both by travelling and remote working.
07/2013
-
06/2015
Project Engineer - Delivery Manager
Lockheed Martin
(Internet and Information Technology, 1000-5000 employees)
* Management of staff, contractors and sub-contract vendors across multi-track work packages; a
mixture of agile and waterfall deliveries.
mixture of agile and waterfall deliveries.
05/2012
-
04/2013
Project Management Consultant
Atkins
* Management of work package and deputising for Project Manager within a predominantly PRINCE2
oriented environment.
* Significant financial management upskilling, eg. revenue recognition, accruals, and forecasting.
Smagile Agile Consultant CV (James Farley)
oriented environment.
* Significant financial management upskilling, eg. revenue recognition, accruals, and forecasting.
Smagile Agile Consultant CV (James Farley)
04/2005
-
04/2012
Soldier
HM Forces
* Activities centred around supporting the UK's Counter mission, in Electronic Warfare roles; ranging
communications & intelligence analysis to Assault IED Disposal.
communications & intelligence analysis to Assault IED Disposal.
Certifications
Local Availability
Open to travel worldwide
