We are on a mission to protect and restore nature, and to inspire everyone to value our natural world. As such, you will join NatureScot at a pivotal time as we take a leading role in implementing a new Biodiversity Strategy for Scotland, critical for addressing the twin nature/climate crises. You will be expected to play a key role in shaping our future digital service delivery as a lead expert in Agile for the organisation. This will include responding to evolving digital service demands and building the capability and expertise within and beyond the Project Management team. The role will work autonomously to establish and enable agile teams to deliver critical digital projects using appropriate agile methodologies such as Scrum and Kanban, and be accountable for team performance. It will work collaboratively with business leads and agile specialists to understand and implement what is most important to the delivery of digital products and services. The role requires a well-developed expertise in agile approaches and methodologies, with the ability to coach and mentor others, grow organisational capability and support our transformation ambitions while enabling digital delivery teams from within., 1. Guide digital delivery team(s) in agile best practices, helping to remove impediments and fostering a culture of continuous learning and improvement, consistent quality and continuously flow of value. 2. Coordinate the delivery flow of assigned teams, identification and mitigation of risks, issues and dependencies, and guide the delivery pace to maintain delivery momentum. 3. Enable assigned teams to operate with agile values, empowering them to refine and adapt ways of working to increase productivity, transparency, frequency and quality of delivery i.e. become high performing. 4. Build trusted and safe environments where questions and problems can be raised without fear. 5. Help the team to produce deliverables that meet agreed quality standards and drive continuous improvement through use of data. 6. Establish strong relationships with a wide range of stakeholders to support agile delivery of key projects in the Digital Delivery Programme. 7. Understand the cost and value of significant projects and consider the impact of user needs and demands on financial viability 8. Proactively and flexibly deal with varied and complex situations and be able to challenge mindsets and assumptions to achieve optimum results. 9. Use agile approaches to improve systems and structures to deliver more streamlined products and services 10. Provide agile advice on how and when third parties should be used in support of digital, data and technology projects 11. Encourage collaborative working across teams, facilitating communication between technical and non-technical stakeholders, decision making and conflict resolution. Skills (Please refer to these in your supporting Statement),
* Coach, train and lead teams in agile and lean values and principles, and methodology-associated practices;
* Act as a recognised expert and advocate, continuously reflecting and challenging team(s);
* Create/tailor new or adapt existing ways of working, and constantly innovate.
Communicating between the technical and non-technical You can:
* Communicate and listen well;
* Mediate between people and mend relationships, communicating with stakeholders at all levels using your excellent facilitation, collaboration and coaching skills;
* Understand and are familiar with the language and procedures of the technical community and understand the software development lifecycle;
* Manage stakeholder expectations and moderate discussions about high risk and complexity, even within constrained timescales
Life cycle perspective You can:
* Recognise when it is right to move forward and when it is right to stop;
* Plan and engage with the right stakeholders at different project stages as appropriate to enable agile delivery teams.
Making a process work You can:
* Identify and challenge organisational processes that are unnecessary, or are unnecessarily complicated;
* Add value and can coach individuals, teams and the organisation to inspect and adapt processes;
* Actively address the most complicated risks, issues and dependencies including where ownership exists outside the team or no clear ownership exists;
* Guide teams through the implementation of a new process.
Planning You can:
* Lead a continual planning process for digital delivery team(s) in a highly complex environment which extends beyond product delivery;
* Identify dependencies in plans across services and co-ordinate delivery.
Team dynamics and collaboration You can:
* Identify problems or issues in the team dynamics and rectify them;
* Identify issues through agile 'health checks' with the team, and help to stimulate the right responses;
* Engage in varying types of feedback, choosing the right type at the appropriate time and ensuring the discussion and decision(s) stick., Whether working at home or in an office, or travelling to meetings and site visits, as a NatureScot you will contribute to our Net Zero plan, for example through positive carbon travel choices. You will aim to minimise travel in accordance with NatureScot's low carbon operating procedures. However, you will, in some circumstances, be expected to work with colleagues and stakeholders from across Scotland, which will involve some travel and may involve overnight stays.
Demonstrate the agile competencies and expertise required to undertake this role, gained through working in a similar role such as Agile Coach, Scrum Master, Agile Delivery Manager or Agile Team Lead, OR a degree or equivalent professional qualification, SVQ Level 7, Masters level.
Agile and Lean practices,
* Commercial management - take responsibility for complex relationships with contracted suppliers.
* Good understanding of the full remit of NatureScot's work and its priorities.
Experience with:
* Product development within Digital First or GDS standards
Prerequisites Required
* Proof of right to work in UK.
* To undertake a Disclosure Scotland application.
* Although Gaelic language is not a prerequisite it is a desirable skill in support of our commitment to our Gaelic Language Plan
Nature is vital to us all, so it's important that NatureScot represents the people of Scotland. The more diverse our workforce is, the more effectively we can connect everyone with nature. We encourage applications from candidates of all ages and genders, people from ethnic minority groups, people with disabilities, and the LGBTQ+ community.
NatureScot offers some great benefits to reward and support you whilst you are working for us. Our benefits package includes the civil service pension scheme, a generous holiday leave allowance plus flexi time, and employee discount scheme. Visit the NatureScot website for further details.