Squad Lead (16 month secondment)

16 Month Fixed Term Contract

Job Purpose

A Squad Lead is part of the Squad Leadership within an ART/Capability. The Squad Lead has overall accountability for the success of the Squad, acting both as a servant leader and coach for the Tribe. The main responsibility of the Squad Leads are; removing blockers, ensuring progress can be made by team members by removing issues outside of their control, dealing with any organisational impediments, and protecting the squad from unnecessary distraction. The squad lead is responsible for the day to day agile management activities such as running the Scrum process. The Squad Lead as a servant leader, has responsibility for upskilling the Squad in agile ways of working that enable the squad to self-organise, manage and deliver value using agile methodology.

Accountabilities

• Accountable for maximising Squad’s ability to deliver Sprint goals and contribute to Tribe OKRs.
• Accountable for Squad level ceremonies integrity, consistency and effectiveness driving Squad value.
• Accountable to both the Squad as a whole and each individual Squad member performing as a servant leader.
• Accountable for supporting the Squad to live the following values: productivity, quality, transparency, and openness over internal politics in everything it does.

Responsibilities:

• Responsible for ensuring Squad level ceremonies like Daily Huddles, Sprint Planning, Sprint Demos, Sprint Review etc. are conducted focusing on value return.
• Responsible for the effective and consistent operational performance for the scrum process as the Squad Lead.
• Responsible for Identifying, tracking, removing and escalating both blockers and impediments at Squad level to maintain both pace and flow of value.
• Responsible for ensuring compliance to Guardrails and Squad level activities.
• Responsible for owning and managing risks, issues and dependencies at Squad level.
• Responsible for managing and resolving intra-Squad dependencies by working with other Squad Leads within the Tribe.
• Responsible for both timely and effective tracking and reporting on Squad’s progress against Sprint goals to Tribe Leadership.
• Responsible for managing Squad capacity including administrating absences for squad members, utilisation and velocity. Actively engages with other Squad Leads in the Tribe and Tribe leadership to discuss resourcing and utilisation strategies.
• Responsible for providing Chapter Lead with relevant input for each Squad member supporting each Squad member’s development and performance needs.
• Responsibility to support the Chapter Lead for Pastoral Care where required.
• Responsibility to support the Chapter Lead with planning and executing recruitment of staff.
• Responsibility to support the Chapter Lead to review employee satisfaction and performance.

Key interactions:

• Coaches Squad team members in Lean-Agile practices and mindsets.
• Support Product Owner(s) with Squad backlog management.
• Collaborates and consults with other Squad Leads in the Tribe to manage resourcing and dependencies.
• Supports Tribe leadership in optimising value flow for the Tribe.
• Works with the Chapter Lead to assist in the development of capability.
• Works with the Chapter Lead to help with Pastoral care for squad members where agreed and required.
• Works with the Chapter Lead to assist with planning and executing the recruitment for the squad.
• Works with the Chapter Lead to review employee satisfaction and performance.

Knowledge and Experience Required

• Knowledge and experience of Agile development techniques like: User Stories, Continuous Integration, ATDD - Acceptance Test Driven Development, TDD - Test-driven development, Continuous Testing, Pairing and Automated Testing.
• Knowledge and experience of using Kanban Boards including the production of effective and timely squad performance monitoring reporting.
• Knowledge and experience with operating with an embedded SDLC process underpinned by Lean Agile practices.
• Project management fundamentals with the ability to apply principles, tools and techniques to develop/plan, manage or execute projects to ensure successful completion.
• Delivery Management or Scrum Master experience for some years’ operating with software development team that was applying scrum mastery techniques, lean agile principles and practices resulting in effective ROI.
• Experience operating within heavily regulated environments including external regulated consumer products and service offerings.
• Knowledge and experience in the use of tools such as: Jira, Confluence etc.

Desirable Professional Training Requirements

• SAFe® 5 Agilist certification.
• Agile Management Foundation.
• Scrum Master certification (CSM Certified Scrum Master, PSM – Professional Scrum Master).

Admiral: Where You Can

We take pride in being a diverse and inclusive business. It's a place where you can Be You, and show up as you are. We’re committed to fostering a people-first culture where everyone is accepted, supported, and empowered to be brilliant. You can, Grow And Progress at a pace and direction that suits you, Make A Difference for our customers and each other, and Share in Our Future with all colleagues eligible for up to £3,600 of free shares each year after one year of service.

Everyone receives 33 days holiday (including bank holidays) when they join us, increasing the longer you stay with us, up to a maximum of 38 days (including bank holidays). You also have the option to buy or sell up to an additional five days of annual leave.

We’re proud of our people-first culture. In fact, we've been recognised as a Great Place to Work for Women, a Great Place to Work for Wellbeing, and an overall Great Place to Work for over 25 years! We’re fully committed to making sure your progression is not slowed or halted by barriers related to race, gender, age, sexuality or any of the protected characteristics.

Our fantastic benefits make sure our colleagues have a great work-life balance; You can view some of our other key benefits here.

Disability Confident Leader

As a Disability Confident Leader, for candidates with a disability or long-term health condition, that opt into the Disability Confident scheme, we’ll invite a fair and proportionate number of applicants that meet the essential requirements of the role to the first stage of our selection process.

If you need any adjustments or support with your application or during the recruitment process, just let us know. Please do email us. This number is dedicated to supporting candidates that require reasonable adjustments or support during the application process.